


Wonderless

by Elvamire



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Inspired by Photography, Modeling, Nude Modeling, References to eating disorders, Romance, non magical au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-21
Updated: 2014-01-31
Packaged: 2017-12-24 06:17:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 27,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/936395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elvamire/pseuds/Elvamire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Non-Magical AU. Teddy Lupin is a photographer with dreams of artistic integrity relegating to snapping pictures for lads' mags. Unable to make it as an actress, Victoire Weasley has found herself posing for glamour pictures. Alone and adrift in London as they both rapidly loose faith in their chosen professions, the two meet and are torn apart by the city more than just once, but Victoire promised Teddy a real photo shoot, one day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want

**Author's Note:**

> Also hosted on fanfiction.net under the pen name w0lfermelon.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Good times for a change_  
>  See, the luck I've had  
> Can make a good man  
> Turn bad 
> 
> _So please please please_  
>  Let me, let me, let me  
> Let me get what I want  
> This time." 

Teddy had set his alarm for nine in the morning, but had managed to sleep through it on account of the sound being muffled by his pillow. As such, he didn’t actually roll out of bed until around noon.

“It’s too early for this.” He muttered to himself, rubbing sleep out of his eyes and glancing absently around his flat. It was a studio, tiny and something of a mess, with the bed unmade to the point that the grey sheets were recoiling from the mattress and dirty dishes piling menacingly high in the sink. The artwork on the walls was hung crookedly, and the calendar was two months out of date. The only thing in his home that was clean was the multi-level rat cage in the corner next to the sofa, where Loki, Hermes and Puck lived a better quality of life than Teddy ever hoped to.

                Teddy pottered about in his boxers for some time, changing the food and water for his rats and receiving a bite on the finger from Loki for his trouble, and leaning against the kitchen counter eating cereal out of a bowl that was mostly clean. He was chewing contentedly on a mouthful of soggy Cornflakes when he decided to glance at the clock, and did a rapid double take.

Swearing, Teddy dropped the bowl unceremoniously into the sink and winced at the sound of cracking ceramic, stumbling over to the dresser by his bed that stored all of his clothes. He hadn’t realised he’d slept in at all, let alone how late. He had to be at the shoot for one in the afternoon.

The curtains were wide open as he stumbled out of his old underwear and into a new outfit, but he honestly no longer cared about how much of his body the sweet old lady across the street saw. It would be nothing new to her by this point, if she hadn’t already dropped dead of a heart attack when he’d left the curtains open on that threesome with the Russian models.

`               Dressed, Teddy grabbed his camera, his baby, from where it lay on his nightstand and hung it from around his neck. He paused a moment in front of the bathroom mirror to insert the contacts he couldn’t see with out, but most people assumed were for aesthetic reasons. He supposed it was his own fault for buying them with coloured yellow irises.

He grabbed his satchel (his man-bag, as his dear god brother so eloquently put it) and blazer on the way out of the door as he called goodbye to his rats. Then he was dashing down the stairs, taking them two at a time. There was a lift in the building, but a race between it and a mildly brain damaged snail would have been a photo finish. Most of the building was in at least a minor state of disrepair, with graffiti on the exposed stone walls of the stairwell and burn marks from cigarette butts on the ground. It was affordable, though, and that was the main point.

                Teddy squinted in the sunlight when he emerged from the building, holding up his free hand over his eyes as the other finished pulling the blazer on over his striped shirt. London was bright during the summer, and busy, full of even more tourists to compete for space with the natives on the street. On a Saturday, it was busier still. The street outside his building was crowded with people, some hurrying and others dawdling or stopping right in the middle of the pavement to stare slack-jawed at maps. Teddy had no idea why anyone would want to go on holiday to London. Then again, he had no idea why anyone would want to live in London, either, but he still did.

He joined the masses of people that actually seemed to want to get where they were going sometime within the next few years, dodging through the crowds to get to the nearest Underground station. The delay of lying in and not realising he’d done so had eaten a chunk out of his morning, and if he didn’t hurry he wasn’t going to be at the shoot on time.

                Navigating the Underground had been a nightmare when he’d first moved to the city, fresh out of university and far more optimistic than he could ever remember being at the present day. Over time it had grown to be second nature, even during the busy days like this one. He’d never been to the hotel that was his destination before, but he had it’s name and the lines he needed to take to get to it written down on a scrap of paper in the pocket of his skinny jeans, so that wasn’t a problem.

But even in his best moods, Teddy hated the Underground still. It became even worse in the summer months, when it was swelteringly hot in the trains as well as cramped. There was no novelty in people watching, he just absolutely did not want to be spoken to. To this end, being on a train instantly turned him into the human incarnation of anti-socialness. He sat down on a seat at the very end of the row, bowed his head to stare defiantly at his lap and crossed his arms over his chest, and put in his headphones to blare The Smiths at a deafening volume. He radiated an air of pure, ‘ _don’t talk to me_.’ Being approached by people during his commute to whatever shooting scene he was going to that day had never ended well for Teddy, they always seemed to be creepy old men or vapid girls lisping about how artistic he was after they’d spotted his camera, and could he maybe take their picture or put in a good word for them?

His spine stayed rigid throughout the entire journey until his stop, at which jumped up and walking briskly away with the music still reverberating around his brain.

_So please, please, please, let me, let me, let me, let me get what I want._

                When he exited the Underground and got back up to street level, the hotel that Teddy was meant to get to became immediately obvious. It was diagonally across the street from the station, dark against the skyline with its windows glaring in the sunlight. Teddy hurried over to it, dodging around gridlocked traffic as he crossed the road before entering the lobby.

It was an expensive place to stay, he could see that much. The carpet was thick and plush beneath his feet, the wallpaper detailed and tasteful. He felt out of place as he moved over towards the golden doors for the lifts, the key for the correct room already in his pocket. In the lift, he removed his headphones and put his iPod away in the satchel, bouncing awkwardly on the balls of his feet until he reached the second floor and stepped out.

The corridor was mirrored at the end of it, creating the illusion that it went on forever. Ignoring uncomfortable flashbacks to _The Shining_ , Teddy wandered along, glancing at the dark, varnished wood of the doors until he found the correct room number emblazoned in gold upon one and let himself in.

                The rest of the minimalist crew for the photo shoot were already there: the makeup artist and hairdresser, wardrobe and the director of the shoot. The latter was a smiling, aging man with a scruffy beard and expanding waistline who came over to enthusiastically shake Teddy’s hand. He reminded him somewhat of his boss.

“Mr Lupin?” He asked, to verify. Teddy nodded. “Good, good, glad you’re finally here. I’m Michael. Call me Michael.”

“I will.” Teddy said with another nod. He glanced around the room, taking it all in. It was as lavish as the rest of the hotel had been, with more pillows than anyone could ever need piled on the silken purple bed sheets and a glass chandelier hanging over head. The curtains had been drawn over the windows, and the tasselled lamps on the nightstands were on. A perfume bottle and open book had been left scattered around- props, Teddy assumed. More lights were set up out of shot, giving the room a slightly gloomy, broody lighting effect.

Impulsively, Teddy broke away from Michael and went over to remove most of the cushions from the bed, putting them to one side where the camera wouldn’t see them. He was already forming a vision of the photographs in his head, and they didn’t include all those pillows. There was something else, too… He opened one set of the curtains a crack, letting sunlight spill into the room and across the bed. Another set that would have been out of shot, he opened more fully, illuminating the hotel room further. He wanted bright, clean lighting.

                Behind him, Michael cleared his throat, and Teddy turned around sheepishly.

“Mr Lupin, I would like to introduce you to our lovely model.” He said, nodding towards the painted white vanity table by the door.

Teddy hadn’t noticed the young woman before, since she had been mostly hidden by the makeup artist still fussing over her. Now, though, as she stood up from the vanity table and walked towards Teddy, he definitely saw her. She had pale blonde hair that had been teased into large, volumized curls around her head and aggressively sprayed into place. Her heart-shaped face was heavily made up, pale skin covered by a layer of foundation and her large, light blue eyes surrounded with sultry, smoky shadow while her eyelashes were lengthened with fakes. Her full, curved lips had been glossed over, pink and shining.

Teddy thought, for a moment, that she was the most attractive woman he’d ever seen.

“This is Victoria de la Cour.” Michael introduced the model, to which she smiled faintly. Teddy had seen enough fake smiles in his time to know them by now, but he said nothing about it.

                Without being asked, Victoria went to sit down on the edge of the king size bed. She was wearing nothing but a pink silk dressing gown, and her legs were hugged by dark, sheer tights where they emerged beneath it. Her shoes were black stiletto heels. Once she had sat down, she slid the dressing gown off and handed it to the waiting wardrobe assistant, revealing the lingerie beneath- it too was pink silk, edged and adorned with black lace and fitting perfectly to the contours of her body, the bra pushing her breasts up and together.

                Glamour work was not something that Teddy had ever wanted to get into. His preferred type of photography was artful, indie, innovative and original. When he did photograph people- which was rare- they were unique-looking girls in forests and brooding by lakes, with the focus on their environment and interaction with it. He wanted to take pictures that would be regarded as art, and make people think. Photographing girls who would be published in glossy magazines on the top shelf of the newsagents was not his great ambition. It had been novel and fun for the first few weeks, but he quickly began to grow desensitized even to nearly-nude attractive women spreading themselves out in front of him. He’d complained to James over texts that soon enough he wouldn’t even be able to get it up anymore when faced with a naked, willing girl. However, freelance artsy pictures had been getting him nowhere. The photography company he’d ended up working for specialised in glamour, so glamour models were what he photographed. At least he earned a living from it.

                This girl, though… he suddenly didn’t feel so resentful towards his job. She was so, so beautiful.

“Are you ready?” Victoria asked from the bed, her head tilted curiously, childishly. Her voice was sweet and soft, and Teddy could only nod. She smiled again, a smaller smile but still a fake one, and began to pose.

She knew all about glamour modelling, that much was clear. She lay on her back on the bed with her legs in the air, showing off the suspenders that held up her stockings while her hands lay on her breasts, hair spilling over the edge of the bed as she gazed innocently at the camera. She sat cross-legged on the sheets and peered at the lens through her curled hair, one corner of her mouth curled up in a smile. She let her heels trail on the floor as she hugged a pillow, looking like she might laugh. She was playful, she was quirky, she was different. She conveyed innocence and enjoyment and that, Teddy thought, was sexier than any brooding pout he’d seen so far.

Then just like that, she had changed, and suddenly she _was_ sex. She oozed sensuality, crouched like a cougar on the bed and biting her lip at the camera. She laid on her back, euphoric and falsely post-orgasmic, the straps of her designer bra down around her shoulders. She turned to face away from the camera and pulled her briefs down slightly, exposing the creamy pale skin of her backside. She pouted, preened, pushed her breasts towards the lens and made faces like she was in the most intense, yet subdued pleasure Teddy had ever seen. She was sexy, and classy, and again he thought about how beautiful she was. His camera clicked and clicked, capturing image after image of Victoria, of her back arched as she lay on all fours on the bed, then lying with the tips of her fingers creeping inside her briefs, then her arse in the air and face in the pillows, breathless, exuding arousal. She _knew_ how to model, how to make the camera love her as much as the men buying her magazine would.

                “Brilliant, isn’t she?” Michael whispered conspirationally to Teddy when the shoot was over and he was looking pointedly away from Victoria as she dressed, and yet again, the young photographer could only nod.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unbeta'd, as always. Comments pointing out any errors are a-okay with me.


	2. There Is A Light That Never Goes Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Take me out tonight  
>  Because I want to see people  
> And I want to see life."_

Despite Michael’s wishes, Teddy left the hotel quickly after the shoot was over; he had little desire to linger with these people and make idle talk whilst trying to ignore Victoria changing in the corner.

The street outside had been quiet when he’d entered the hotel, and it was even quieter now that a little more time had passed. Standing just beside the hotel steps, he decided he was alone enough to risk it. He blindly rummaged around inside his satchel until he managed to produce a pack of Marlboros and a plain lighter made of blue plastic. He took a cigarette from the pack and lit it, lifting it to his lips and taking a drag. He could have smoked out of the window of his flat just as easily, but he’d been craving one now and didn’t have the patience to wait.

When the cigarette had dwindled slowly down, leaving neat piles of ash on the concrete around Teddy’s feet, he heard the door open behind him. He paused, glancing over his shoulder and blinking in faint, irrational surprise to see Victoria walking down the steps. She had changed, obviously, into actual clothes rather than lingerie just covered by a dressing gown. The actual surprise, he thought, came from _what_ she was wearing; a plain white dress cinched in at the waist with a silver belt, grey wool tights and an oversized, dark magenta duffle coat. It seemed like such a simple outfit, and so demure with the dress almost reaching her knees and the flat shoes on her feet, that it wasn’t something Teddy would have expected a glamour model to wear. Stereotypical, perhaps, but he’d met enough of them by now to build up an opinion.

                The model’s eyes found Teddy and she glanced quickly away, almost as if embarrassed. Frowning a little, he called hello to her anyway, and she looked back at him like a startled rabbit.

“Hello.” She replied in return stopping in front of Teddy with her pale fingers clutching the strap of the bag over her shoulder.

“I just wanted to tell you that you’re a really good model.” Teddy said to her, which admittedly may not have been all he wanted, but still. “Honestly. You’re one of the best I’ve seen, and I’ve been doing this job for a while.”

Victoria looked wary, but she nodded slowly.

“Thank you.” She said, and was silent. Scrambling for a way to fix the conversation before it was lost, Teddy continued,

“Actually, Victoria, I-”

To his surprise, she interrupted him.

“You do know that’s not my real name, don’t you?” She said, seeming a little irritated by his use of it. Teddy smiled wryly.

“I had a feeling. What is your name, then?” He asked. He knew a lot of models didn’t use their real name for their work, and something like Victoria de la Cour was blatantly fake.

The blonde paused before answering, shifting awkwardly on the spot. Away from the shoot, she carried herself with an entirely different demeanour. The perfectly styled hair and heavy but tasteful makeup looked odd on her, like a child who had raided her mother’s dressing table. More than that, it didn’t match her clothes at all.

“Victoire.” She finally replied. “Victoire Weasley.”

Teddy beamed, extending a hand which she shook hesitantly. He saw her eyes flicker to the cigarette held loose between his fingers, wrinkling her nose distastefully. _Adorable_ was not a word he thought he ever would have applied to a glamour model, but…

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Victoire.” Teddy said with his most charming smile. “I’m Edward Lupin. No one’s actually called me that in my entire life, though- it’s Teddy.” He told her. She smiled; the tiniest smile possible, but more honest than the ones he’d seen back in the hotel room.

“ _Enchanté_.” Victoire said.

Teddy saw now why her fake name was what it was- Victoria sounded similar enough to Victoire, although one thing still puzzled him slightly despite her use of French.

“So, why de la Cour, of all the last names you could have picked?” He asked curiously. Victoire seemed dubious about answering, and even still slightly confused at his attention, but she shrugged and answered regardless.

“My mother’s maiden name was Delacour. I always liked it.” She said, her fingers playing with the strap of her bag. Her eyes didn’t remain stationary on Teddy, but rather darted around, watching the road one moment and staring at a scrap of chewing gum stuck to the pavement the next. Teddy could have made an educated guess that she would head off soon, back home, and he would probably never see her again. He found, too, that it wasn’t what he wanted to happen. Something about the features of this girl’s face and the guarded yet oddly innocent look in her eyes was inactivating to him. He wanted to sleep with her, he recognised that much, and more than that, he wanted to photograph her.

“It is a nice name.” He agreed, a little more hurriedly than the suave, flirtatious side of him would have liked, and then continued, “Listen, Victoire, are you doing anything right now?”

Victoire blinked at him, shifting her weight from one foot to the other before shaking her head. She was smiling again, slightly and crookedly, a knowing smile.

“Would you like to have lunch with me?” Teddy asked. “I haven’t eaten yet, so I was going to get something anyway, and if you’d like to join me that would make my day.” He said, flashing her a winning smile. It was true, too- he was starving. However, he’d only been planning to grab a McDonalds on the way back to his flat. If Victoire accepted his invitation, he’d have to pay out for a proper meal at a restaurant. Nevertheless, he wanted her to accept. He wanted a chance to talk to her, to watch her and the delicate way she moved.

“I think I will.” Victoire replied with another smile and a helpless little shrug. Teddy beamed, then frowned as a thought occurred to him.

“I, uh, don’t really know my way around this part of London.” He admitted, running a hand through his hair somewhat awkwardly. “So if you’re willing to get the tube-”

“No need.” Victoire interjected smoothly. “I know my way around here. There’s a café two streets down that’s absolutely lovely, if you’d like to go there.”

“Sure, sure.” Teddy nodded enthusiastically. Anything to persuade this girl that he was worth spending time with.

Victoire smiled again before moving as if to head off down the street. Teddy paused to drop his cigarette and crush it underneath his shoe before he followed her.

“That’s a vile habit, you know.” Victoire said, making a mildly disapproving, mildly disgusted facial expression that wrinkled her nose. “It smells, and it’s bad for you.”

“And here I was thinking you weren’t the type to lecture strangers on their habits.” Teddy shrugged. “I picked it up when I was fourteen and never had the power to quit.”

“Fascinating.” Victoire said dryly, then looked away from him to point down the street. “It’s just down here.”

                The café turned out to be a small, yet charming little hole-in-the-wall establishment. The inner walls were painted white and the floor was a pale laminate, with plants grouped in corners and art pieces mixed with photography adorning the walls. There was a specials menu written on a blackboard that leant against the counter, and Teddy couldn’t see a single table in there which had any more than two seats grouped around it.

The main menu was on the wall behind the counter, printed in minimalist font. Everything was expensive, and gave the impression that it would be served in a tiny portion on a square plate.

“Would you mind if I went to the bathroom for just a moment?” Victoire turned to ask. “You can order while I’m gone, I’ll just tell you what I want-”

“Uh.” Teddy stammered, wondering how to best cover up the fact that he had no idea what he was supposed to do in this sort of place. He was a creature of habit, and habit meant takeaways. “Actually, it’s- I think I’d rather you ordered for me, since you- you know this place and everything.”

Victoire frowned, a small crease running along the skin of her forehead.

“Okay. Could you get us a table, then?”

Teddy nodded, and went to sit down in a corner that still managed to be adjacent to a window. The entire front of the café seemed to be windows, from what he could tell.

He watched Victoire disappear into the ladies’ bathroom before he let his head drop into his hand. Other glamour models he’d spoken to after the shoot had ended up back at his flat very shortly, and not for private pictures. He never properly socialised with them, and they certainly didn’t drag him to fancy cafes. Victoire, clearly, was a cultured and refined woman despite the profession she had fallen into. Teddy had no business spending any time at all with her.

                He wallowed in his own self doubt and bad decisions until Victoire returned to the table, carrying a tray of food. The tray lifted his spirits immensely- it was brown, textured plastic, like every tray he’d ever seen in a fast food restaurant in his life. The tray seemed like home. The china the food was on made him feel better too- is was round, and the patterns were mismatched.

When Victoire sat down, Teddy’s eyes widened. In the bathroom, she’d brushed the hairspray out of her blonde locks so that the curled style had come away, letting it fall naturally to the small of her back.  It wasn’t straight, but waved. The makeup was gone too, leaving her face bare; he saw for the first time the freckles that dusted the tops of her cheeks. They made her look like a pixie. She looked like no one he’d ever expect to see immortalized in their underwear on the pages of a magazine.

“I know it’s a bit early, but I was craving afternoon tea.” Victoire confided, passing over to Teddy a plate of egg and cress sandwiches, and then another with a muffin on it. Her sandwiches were cucumber, and the muffin replaced by a scone. She’d brought teacups on saucers to the table as well, and a steaming tea pot.

Teddy was at a loss. The food looked good, but like it would make him even hungrier than he already was. Afternoon tea was a foreign concept to him, and he hadn’t even been aware cafes like this one existed in London.

Victoire, meanwhile, was calmly pouring tea into a pastel blue china cup and stirring in copious amounts of sugar. She lifted it to her pink lips and sipped. Teddy’s gaze fell on her, and as far as he was concerned, his sandwiches no longer existed. With the makeup gone and her hair undone, she seemed even lovelier than before. She was paler, and not nearly as perfect, but she matched her clothes now and seemed infinitely more comfortable in her own skin. The sunlight through the windows made her hair lighter and her skin glow, and with her eyes downcast and their lashes fanning down across her cheeks, she seemed almost ethereal. She was a lost faery, sitting in a teashop. Again, Teddy ached for his camera. He wanted to photograph her in the autumn woods with sunlight filtering down through the dying leaves, soaked on a beach with her white dress clinging to her skin, dirty and winged on a rooftop, a bird in the world. Every time he looked at her, he thought of pictures he could take of her.

                The spell was broken by the muffled sounds of music from his pocket. Teddy was too distracted to hear it, but Victoire was not.

“Your phone’s ringing.” She told him, ignoring the napkin to wipe a smear of butter off her lips with a finger. It took a moment for Teddy to process the words, but when he did, he grabbed his phone and ignored the call. He didn’t care who it was- he wanted to be alone with Victoire. He looked back at her, and she was smiling.

“ _There is a light and it never goes out_.” She sang quietly and rather off-key. Her singing voice was girlish, like that of a child. “I love The Smiths.”

Teddy thanked his stars that he had ever picked that song for his ringtone. He dived headfirst into conversation.

“Do you like hipster music, then?” He asked enthusiastically and yet self-deprecatingly, imagining the bands they could discuss, the far-fetched scenarios of concerts he could take her to. To his dismay, Victoire shook her head.

“No, I just like old music,” She corrected him, and added after a moment, “And Regina Spektor.”

Teddy was floored. There was a girl sitting in front of him who looked like a faery and liked Regina Spektor. He wasn’t sure what he’d done to deserve this, but he planned to do a lot more of it. If only he could actually figure out what to say to her.

In lieu of conversation, he began attacking the food that Victoire had selected for him. ‘Selected,’ in this case simply meant, ‘picked randomly from the menu,’ but Teddy had no way of knowing that.

“So was posing naked always what you wanted to do for a living?” He finally spoke, through a mouthful of egg and cress, and was instantly horrified. His eyes were on the table top, but in his periphery he saw Victoire freeze.

“Actually, no.” She said with a twisted, wrong smile. She clasped her hands together on the table, looking down rather than daring to face Teddy. “I wanted to be an actress. Not in films, or television, but a stage actress.” She shrugged, an attempt to appear nonchalant that failed horribly. “I never got any parts. I had to earn money somehow.”

“And you chose glamour modelling?” Teddy said, raising an eyebrow at her. Victoire gave him a sharp look.

“It earns more money than standing behind a till at the corner shop would. And at least I’m still putting myself in the public eye- it’s almost like performing.” She sounded like she was trying to defend the modelling to herself, rather than Teddy. He tried to quickly change the subject.

“So is that why you came to London? You wanted to be an actress?” He asked her, hoping he sounded as interested in her as he actually was. Her, and not what was under the skirt of her dress.

“No.” Victoire shook her head. “My parents live in a tiny cottage in a tiny village right by the sea. It’s very quaint and beautiful, but I hated it. I always wanted to live in a big city. London seemed like the biggest.”

Teddy nodded pensively, drinking in her words.

“I like London, but I liked my gran’s house too- she lived in a tiny place, like your parents.” Teddy said. “I’d have stayed there, but there weren’t any photography opportunities. Not like there are here.” He explained. Victoire tilted her head quizzically. Teddy knew instantly what she was wondering. It was the same thing everyone wondered. She was wondering why he was talking about his gran. An intelligent girl like Victoire, he guessed, would be able to figure out that it was because he’d lived with her, so now she’d be wondering why that was.

He wouldn’t tell her. He wanted her to think he was interesting, but telling the sob story of his poor dead parents wouldn’t do that. It would just make her pity him.

                Teddy looked at Victoire, and Victoire looked at the table and then at the counter before abruptly getting up. The chair complained as it scraped along the wooden floor.

“I’ll pay the bill.” She offered. “And then we can both go home, okay?”

Teddy felt like his stomach had tried to do a flip but tripped over halfway through. He didn’t want to lose Victoire’s company so soon. She would disappear into the crowds of the city and he would never find her again.

“If you’re paying, then, will you let me walk you home?” He asked her with a crooked, charming smile as he stood up from his own chair. “I have to find some way to be chivalrous.”

“Chivalry is just a nicer word for sexism.” Victoire said in a tone of voice that suggested she didn’t actually believe that. “You can walk me to the tube station. I don’t like people seeing where I live.”

“Fair enough.” Teddy nodded.

                As the pair walked towards the tube station, they talked. Their topics weren’t anything like their chosen careers or their reasons for coming to London, but far simpler- where they liked to holiday, co-workers who annoyed them, music they listened to and books they read (Victoire liked classics and plays, and Teddy had to find some way to make goofy horror comedies and Terry Pratchett seem as good as that. He succeeded only because Victoire’s favourite book was, apparently, _Good Omens_.)

They slowed to a stop in front of the steps that would lead down into the tube station. Victoire smiled almost apologetically at Teddy, nervously shifting the position of her bag on her shoulder.

“I’ve had a lovely afternoon, Teddy.” She told him.

“Me too.” Teddy said. The smile that accompanied the statement was perhaps a little overzealous.

“I like talking to you.” She admitted, tucking her blonde hair behind her ear on one side. Teddy could have sworn it was slightly tapered, but he knew that was probably just his own faery analogy running away with him.

“I like talking to you, too. I think you’re amazing.” He said, taking a small step closer to her. She was shorter than him by several inches. Despite his preference for tall girls, he found it endearing.

Teddy bowed his head slightly, leaning in towards her with his gaze focused on her full lips. He wondered how they would feel against his, how soft and silky they would be. He imagined her shoulders under his hands, delicate and vulnerable under him.

At the last second, Victoire turned her head to the side and took a step backwards. The freckled tops of her cheeks had taken on a pink flush.

“Goodbye, Teddy.” She said, and headed down the stairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Good Omens is a brilliant book that I suggest you read. And the ‘goofy horror comedy’ that Teddy is a fan of is John Dies at the End by David Wong, also fantastic.  
> 


	3. Mr. Brightside

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Jealousy, turning saints into the sea  
>  Swimming through sick lullabies  
> Choking on your alibis."_

It was the first time in months that Teddy had bought a magazine containing his own work. Back when he’d first started taking glamour pictures, he’d bought everything- it was a record of his achievements, almost. But as the novelty of the profession wore off, so did the desire to own a copy of his pictures in print. He’d been there and seen the girl in person, slept with many of them. He didn’t need a magazine to remember, and besides that, he no longer wanted to remember.

The photographs he’d taken of Victoire were a very different story. He needed to see them.

However, it had been so long since he’d bought a lads’ mag that he forgot how much it actually embarrassed him. The man at the counter, not much older than Teddy himself, gave him a bemused look that very clearly asked if he actually knew it was easier to find far more explicit things on the internet for free. Teddy just stared down at the floor and hoped the shop boy wouldn’t remember his face.

                Somehow, Teddy managed to wait until he was back at his apartment to open the magazine. He’d been waiting for the publication of his pictures, and actually having them in his hand made his chest tight with anticipation. He hadn’t seen Victoire since their not-quite-a-date in that café, and he’d forgotten the colour of her eyes.

He flicked through the glossy pages, his eyes scanning over girls of varying ethnicity, breast size and level of nakedness, but with an almost uniform body type. They were all forgotten by the time he even turned the page.

Teddy found Victoire towards the back of the magazine, accidentally skipping past her and having to go back. She was printed on a two-page spread, and the magazine had chosen to print the pictures from the latter half of the shoot, when the quirky playfulness was replaced by seduction. Victoire’s eyes- blue, he saw, they were a pale blue- stared out at him from the page, her teeth biting her lip and crouched on a bed. On the second page, larger, she looked over her shoulder and pulled down her briefs, just slightly. She had been photoshopped. Her glossy pink lips had been made a dark cherry instead, and her teeth were whiter and her skin smoother, devoid of the few freckles and marks he himself had seen on her. The lighting and colours were subtly different, too. Teddy found it completely unnecessary, but he’d also found her makeup unnecessary. She was beautiful enough.

There was a small amount written about her, that her name was Victoria and she was nineteen. Reading through, most of it was inconsequential and, Teddy would have guessed, false. Pure filler.

After continuing to stare blankly at the photographs for a few more moments, Teddy closed the magazine and threw it into a corner with more force than was probably necessary. He was full of regret, for not kissing Victoire, for not getting her number, for having lost her for good just like he’d feared and for letting a girl he barely knew cloud his thoughts so much.

 

**XXX**

 

Imogen was gorgeous. Teddy had stuck around after he’d shot pictures of her, chatted, invited her back to his flat. She had declined with a coy smile, and invited him to a party later that week instead- a modelling party, with her fashion model and high-end photographer friends. She only did glamour part time.

She looked better clothed than she did naked, standing outside an building Teddy could never hope to afford to live in and waiting for him in her slinky black cocktail dress and her red, red lipstick. She looked lip Snow White, if Snow White was an expensive prostitute.

“Hi, darling.” Imogen smiled with one half of her mouth when Teddy approached. She had a posh voice, native to some upper class, suburban area of London. She wrapped him instantly into a hug and kissed his cheek, somehow avoiding smudging her lipstick. She was as tall as he was in her heels, a full six feet. “Shall we go up?”

Teddy glanced at the building, panelled with mirrored glass and stretching all the way up towards the moon. He nodded, condemning himself to a mildly awkward ride in the lift while Imogen said absolutely nothing, but hung off his arm and periodically kissed his ear and his neck. Yes, she was gorgeous, but either she was dull or just didn’t see him as worthy of her conversation.

They rode the lift up to the penthouse, when the doors opened and Imogen lead him by the wrist into it. Her fingernails were long and sharp and bloody red, like harpy’s talons.

                The penthouse thumped with life and music. The main lights were switched out, replaced with other low, blue lighting. A disco ball spun and glittered from the ceiling, and Teddy very nearly rolled his eyes. The music, a song by The Killers, roared out from the state of the art sound system in one corner. The flat was still full of furniture, but it was open plan and large enough to fit in an abundance of people. Every one of them was young, trendy and beautiful. Most were girls, models flaunting their perfect bodies in short dresses and stylish skirts. Everyone held glasses of sparkling water, of champagne, of cocktails mixed expertly at the bar that stood by one wall. There was food, spread elegantly out across the kitchen counters, but it looked untouched.

“Imogen!” A voice said, all but screaming to be heard over the music. A man wearing a dark suit and equally dark sunglasses appeared like magic from the throng of people, bending to take her hand and kiss it. Teddy’s supposed date smiled and batted her fake lashes. “I’m so glad you could make it.” He peered over her shoulder at Teddy, and raised one eyebrow above the sunglasses.

“Teddy Lupin.” He said, sticking out his hand for the man to shake and suspecting that his voice had been lost and carried away by the music. The man- a manager, Teddy suspected, he looked like the type- did shake his hand, but quickly draped his arm across Imogen’s shoulders and tactfully led her away into the thick of the party.

                Teddy sighed dejectedly, politely closing the door behind him. There went the only person he actually knew here. He didn’t know what he’d expected; loyalty from the model girl he barely knew, or a slightly different sort of party. It wasn’t the sort of thing he’d ever been invited to before. The people in this room were all higher up in the industry and better at their jobs than Teddy was. They did ‘legitimate’ work. Looking around, he could tell them apart easily. The managers and the talent scouts in their glossy suits, the tall and deathly skinny models, the very slightly kooky, kitschy photographers- all within the bounds of what was fashionably acceptable, of course. Everyone was an ultra-glamorous, walking clothing ad, and Teddy felt like a child. A stupid little indie kid in his tight jeans and ironically ugly jumper, his weird cat’s-eye contacts and dumb hair. He’d even brought his camera, hanging around his neck like a battery powered security blanket. Stupid. If he belonged anywhere, it was not at this party, with these people.

                It was in the middle of this mental vitriol against himself that he saw her.

It took three double takes for him to actually realise it was her and not just a convincing doppelganger, and once he realised that he stared openly. She was wearing a dark blue ruched dress that clung tightly to her figure and barely reached her mid-thigh, black sheer tights and fuck-me shoes. Her lips were dark purple and her eye makeup as thick and black as night. Her hair had been aggressively crimped and flipped over to one side of her hair, artfully rebellious and faux-punk. Teddy didn’t understand how she could look so radically different and so identically beautiful.

There was a man standing beside her, his arm looped casually around her waist and hand on her hip. He held a nearly empty glass in his other hand and was talking animatedly to a group of models, whilst she simply stared boredly into the distance and pretended to sip her champagne.

The music seemed very far away, and the crowd as pliant as water when Teddy pushed through it towards her. Before he had a chance to move very far, Victoire saw him. Her dark lips parted in surprise. He watched as she leaned in to the man beside her, speaking into his ear before he removed his arm from around her and dodged through the people milling around the flat, towards him, towards Teddy.

“Teddy?” She said in a higher voice than he remembered her having, as though she wasn’t wholly sure it was him.

“Victoire.” Teddy positively beamed. He hadn’t missed her. He didn’t know her well enough to miss her. But a second chance _to_ know her was something he hadn’t expected to get, and he was unspeakably grateful for it.

Victoire opened her mouth and closed it, repeating the gesture several times before she spoke.

“Balcony?” She suggested, inclining her head towards the glass doors that led outside the penthouse. Wordlessly, Teddy nodded, and followed her through the crowd until they broke free into the cool night air.

                Teddy watched her as she bent at the knees to set her glass down on the tiled floor of the balcony before she made her way to the railing, leaning against it with her arms crossed on top of it. Again, he found himself captivated by the simple sight of her gazing out over the city that it took several moments for him to join her at the railing. He wanted to take her photo.

“The lights that never go out.” Victoire said softly, glancing at Teddy. He glanced back. Her hair had all been pushed to the other side of her head, and he could see her face perfectly.

“What?” Teddy said, intelligently. Victoire smiled faintly, lifting her hand and pointing a finger in the general direction of the glowing city below them. Her nails were painted the same colour as her lips, darkened to black in the moonlight.

“The Smiths.” She said. “ _There Is A Light That Never Goes Out._ I think about the phrase a lot, and I think the light that never goes out is people.” She paused. “I look out of my window at night and I see these lights, all across the city, and every light is a person, every light is a home. People don’t ever go out.”

He wondered why she was telling him this. Somehow, he doubted these were thoughts she shared with everyone. He was struck silent by it.

“Is that the type of thing you think about a lot?” Teddy asked finally, scanning the skyline. City lights, both coloured and clean, blinked and winked and shone at his eyes. London was still alive at this late hour, and he couldn’t help but think about what Victoire had said- after all, someone had to have turned on each light he could see.

“I do think about that type of thing.” Victoire nodded. Her own eyes were fixed on the city too. She’d barely glanced at Teddy at all. “I love London. It’s so beautiful. It’s vibrant, and alive.”

“That’s an interesting way to look at it.” Teddy scoffed. Victoire raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow.

“How would you look at it, then?” She asked.

“Scummy. Loud. Unfriendly.” Teddy replied. Victoire’s smile was crooked on her lips.

“For shame, Teddy. I thought artists were supposed to see the beauty in things.” She said.

“Call me a cynic.” The young photographer shrugged carelessly. They lapsed back into silence, with Victoire shaking her head and turning her face away from him. To save the conversation, Teddy brought up something which had been puzzling him for the whole three months since he had last seen her.

“I thought you were going to kiss me.” He said, notably more quietly than their previous conversation had been. “Outside the tube station. But you didn’t.” It wasn’t a question, but he phrased it like one. He saw Victoire’s slender shoulders rise and fall with her sigh.

“I was going to.” She admitted. “I wanted to.”

“So why didn’t you?”

“Because if I had, I would have meant nothing to you.” She said it bluntly, like a statement of fact, and her blue eyes were cutting as she looked at him again. “You’re sexy, Teddy, and you’re a glamour photographer. I know you must fuck half the models you see, and just forget them afterwards. I didn’t want to be like that to you. To anyone. I just want to be remembered.”

Teddy shifted awkwardly on the spot. The assessment was too accurate for his liking.

“I only wanted a kiss.” He lied.

“The point still stands that if I’d given you it, you’d have forgot about me. I didn’t give you what you wanted, or what I wanted, and you’ve remembered. You’ve been thinking about me since.” She sounded more unsure than her words would have suggested.  Her blue eyes moved away from him again, watching the sky blankly. She didn’t seem to be seeing anything. “Besides, I had- have- Oscar.”

“The guy back in the party, there.” Teddy guessed, more darkly than he’d intended. The one who’d been touching her, with his athletic body and cool haircut, charismatic and attractive. Now that he thought about it, he actually recognised him- from the tabloids, the celebrity gossip magazines. He was Oliver Wood, the famous goalkeeper’s, son. He had a reputation for decadence and the party lifestyle. Teddy was jealous, not entirely irrationally.

Victoire nodded stiffly.

“We weren’t a couple back then, but he was in my life. It wouldn’t have been right to kiss you.” Somehow, that didn’t sound as important to her as her previous reasons had been.

                Teddy turned his body to the side slightly so that he could look at Victoire, really look at her. His fingers blindly reached for the pack of cigarettes in his pocket, and he lit one before bringing it to his lips. When the smoke started to curl from the end, Victoire finally looked at him, cool blue eyes focused on the cherry end. She was lazily elegant, leaning against the railings like that.

“Can I photograph you?” Teddy asked, finally, the question he’d wanted to voice since he saw her.

“You already have.” Victoire pointed out dryly, her gaze flicking away from the cigarette and back towards the city.

“No, I mean properly.” Teddy shook his head, taking a drag from the cigarette. “Or not properly, I suppose. Not glamour stuff. Arty, indie photos, for my portfolio. I’d put them up on my website.”

Victoire was still watching him out of the corner of her eye, which held a vague spark of interest. Teddy marched valiantly on.

“I could pay you, too. Not a lot, probably, not as much as you get paid to get your kit off, but I would. I just… I think you’re beautiful, Victoire. More beautiful than a city could ever be.” He tapped a bit of ash off the side of the railing, where it was caught by the night breeze before it had a chance to reach the ground. “I’ve never met anyone who looks as good on the camera as you do. Every time I look at you, all I see is the photographs I could take.”

A flicker of something dark and painful crossed Victoire’s face, but it was gone before Teddy had a chance to wonder what he’d done wrong. Then she was turning around, smiling too sweetly at him and plucking the cigarette from between his fingers. She tossed it carelessly over her shoulder, and it followed the ashes that had come from it.

“Of course.” She replied, and Teddy couldn’t remember ever feeling so happy. To photograph someone who looked like Victoire did, he knew, would help his portfolio, his career, immensely. “You don’t have to pay me, either- I’ll do it as your friend.”

“We’re friends?” Said Teddy, surprised. Victoire rolled her eyes, and laughed. It occurred to Teddy for the first time that she had been at the party longer than he had, and was probably tipsy.

“Yes, we’re friends.” She reached out and grabbed his hand, squeezing it with a grin. “Come on. Let’s go back to my flat.”

“What?” Teddy was bewildered.

“You said you wanted to take pictures of me.” 


	4. Violet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"When they get what they want, they never want it again  
>  Go on, take everything, take everything, I want you to."_

Victoire’s flat was in a slightly nicer area than Teddy’s, and when she led him inside of it, it was nicer on the inside too- nicer meaning that her bedroom and the rest of the flat were actually separate. The interior décor wasn’t particularly to his tastes, too clean and modern so that it ended up looking like a show home.

                “Ignore Aziraphale.” Victoire advised upon walking through the front door, when a ginger tabby with the fluffiest fur he’d ever seen began winding his way around Teddy’s ankles, purring. “He never learned how to be a cat, he’s too clingy.”

Teddy ignored the advice in favour of bending down and scratching between the cat’s ears, smiling as he heard the purring pick up from a low rumble to something equivalent to a motorbike engine. Victoire had paused instead of heading further into her flat, turning to watch Teddy pet her cat.

“Named after a fictional character, I like it.” Teddy nodded approvingly before he looked up at her with a grin. “My rats are Loki, Hermes and Puck. My babies, I love them.”

A tiny but true smile crossed Victoire’s face.

“I love animals.” She said, in the same tone of voice she’d used when talking about her interpretations of a song. “I always got on better with them than I did with people. I don’t like people very much.” She shook her head, and the size of her smile grew as the honesty of it faded. “I’m going to go shower and change, if that isn’t a problem with you. You can put on some music, if you like.” She pointed in the direction of the sound system that was pushed against one wall.

Teddy watched her walk away, pushing open the pale pine door to her bedroom and then disappearing from view. From what he could see of the room beyond the crack in the door, it was very white.

                He wandered over to the sound system, followed by a purring Aziraphale the whole way, and examined the CDs in the rack there. Victoire had said she liked old music, he remembered, and she hadn’t been lying- ‘old’ was a rather broad term. There were things along the lines of Bach and Chopin, up to the Beatles, 90’s bands and soundtracks from old films about unintentionally gay vampires and girls lost in labyrinths. And there was Regina Spektor.

Teddy picked a rock band at random, to see what would happen. The vocals came from an aggressive woman and the music behind her was alright, though not his type, so he supposed he was happy.

He backed away from the sound system then, looking around the flat itself. The wood floors were clean and shiny and partially covered by one large rug in white. The furniture and the kitchen counters were white too, accented by shades of lilac and violet. There was no art on the walls, simply empty frames, and photographs of two children on the coffee table. It seemed to him both very feminine and very impersonal, and he instantly disliked Victoire’s decorating style.

                Yet, he felt like he could learn more about this enigma of a girl by looking at the space she lived in. Listening to the hiss of the running shower beneath the thudding base of the album he’d started playing, Teddy paced slowly around Victoire’s living space. Her kitchenette told him nothing and her film collection appeared to be locked away beneath the TV. He chose not to snoop quite so much as to look at it anyway. There was nothing left out on the coffee table or cream sofas, no telltale celebrity gossip magazines or sudoku books. The only thing he could see were the children’s photographs, and even a brief inspection of them betrayed enough of a family resemblance for him to conclude they were Victoire’s brother and sister.

Her bookshelf, however, was on full display. When Victoire had told him she liked classics and plays, that had been a vast understatement- if the shelf was anything to go by, she read _everything_. Shakespeare sat beside John Green and _Les Miserables_ had found a home next to _The Lovely Bones._ Anne Rice and the Bronte sisters shared a shelf, and Neil Gaiman titles provided a healthy dose of black among the riot of colour that was her Discworld collection.

“Classics, my arse.” Teddy muttered. _The Picture of Dorian Gray_ was a classic; _A Series of Unfortunate Events_ was not. He was somewhat in awe of all the books he could see- he himself read only sometimes, and always the same authors. If this was any evidence, Victoire devoured books. Now he began to wonder if she was the type of person to live her life through paper adventures rather than real ones.

Those people had always irritated him.

                He was so absorbed in his observations of her bookshelf, and then the rest of her flat, that he didn’t hear the shower turn off, or the hairdryer, or the bedroom door creaking open further.

“I don’t know if this might be the best place to take pictures.” Victoire said from the doorway, and Teddy turned around to look at her. His eyes widened a little.

Showering had stripped all the makeup from her, revealing the freckles he’d forgotten she had. They covered the tops of her shoulders and thinned out as they made their way down her arms to vanish completely a little above her elbows; they’d been edited out of the pictures in the magazine. Her hair was the same as it had been in the café. She’d put on something white- a dress or a nightgown, he couldn’t tell. Either way, it was simple and sweet and, he suspected, just a temporary measure until he told her what to wear.

Looking at that, he certainly wasn’t going to tell her to change.

“Show me.” He requested.

                Victoire’s bedroom was painted white like the living room, but her bedspread was a mix of cream and eggshell blue, the latter being the same colour as the wall behind it. There were words painted on the wall in stark white, elegantly curled script, surrounded by butterflies: “ _You will go to the paper towns. And you will never come back._ ” Her bed had fairy lights twined around the headboard.

“In here is perfect.” Teddy confirmed, his hands already fidgeting anxiously with the camera as he thought of how to photograph her. “Do you have any red lipstick? Like, hooker red.”

Victoire frowned again, but nodded and made her way to the vanity table that seemed to have taken the place of a dresser in the room. A few minutes later, and her lips had been painted a glossy, cherry red.

“Perfect.” Teddy repeated with another grin, gesturing towards the blue sheets. “Can I have you on the bed?”

Victoire stiffened for a moment at the innuendo in the question, which hadn’t been entirely accidental. However, she made no move to correct him, or remind him of Oscar’s existence. Instead, she simply sat down on the edge of her bed, looking slightly dubious.

“Is this all? Just a shoot with no lighting, in my room, wearing this?” She asked, raising an eyebrow. Teddy nodded.

“Of course.” He smiled. “This is the work I like doing. Organic. Artsy.”

“Hipster.” Victoire teased, but she lay back on her bed anyway. The pose was so simple that Teddy didn’t even know if it was a pose, but he fumbled for his camera anyway because he knew he needed to immortalize it. Victoire on her back, her hair spread out around her and her lips parted just so, hands resting palms-up and fingers curled beside her head. She saw him reaching for the camera and remained still until he’d gotten it, staring deeply into the lens as he took the picture. She didn’t smile.

Teddy zoomed out and took the picture again, this time a full-body rather than upper torso shot. He captured her legs, smooth and pale with the thighs and knees tucked together whiles her calves angled apart.

                Victoire smiled after that, and her hands moved down to squeeze her breasts, one of her legs lifting playfully so that the hem of her dress hiked up her thighs. Teddy shook his head.

“No, no, don’t do the glamour thing.” He half-pleaded. “Just… be you. That’s who I want to take photos of.”

Victoire looked at him in minor confusion- in fact she seemed almost lost, like she didn’t know how not to do ‘the glamour thing.’ Still, she seemed pleased too, smiling as he dropped her hands from her breasts and fixed the hem of her skirt. Her poses were stiff at first, contrived. But as Teddy continued to take more photographs, she grew more relaxed and easy. She was just a girl in her bedroom, sitting and lying and sprawling on her bed. Her eyes gazed at various points in the room, her fingers toying with the duvet and her red, red lips parted ever so slightly. Teddy thought she was beautiful.

                Sometime during the shoot, one of the straps of Victoire’s dress had fallen off her shoulder, dragging part of the garment down with it. Teddy swallowed, his fingers freezing over the capture button and his mouth drying up. Victoire paused, following his gaze and coolly regarding the dipping neckline of her dress. Slowly, she reached up to the strap that was still in place, slipping it off. The dress fell quickly, stopping before it exposed too much, but Teddy could still see the curves of her breasts, smaller without a bra to push them up.

Swallowing, he photographed her like that, knelt on the bed with her dress slipping down. The view on the screen was beautiful, the innocence of her features clashing with the sensuality added by the way she wore her clothes and being added to by the vulnerability of falling fabric. He took more photos as she pulled more poses, rearranging her legs or stretching her arms above her head, lying down on top of the covers.

                Victoire got off the bed and stood up to pose more, and her neckline dipped further. With the air of someone brushing off an irritating insect, she shrugged the dress off. It fell, pooling around her ankles on the bedroom floor.

Teddy stopped breathing. There was nothing to do but stare at her, stare at her pale, perfect skin and her small, rounded breasts, the triangle of trimmed blonde hairs between her legs.

“Can I-?” Teddy asked, nodding towards the camera. He sounded strangled even to himself, and Victoire smiled.

“I wouldn’t have taken it off if you couldn’t.” She replied.

                The camera continued snapping pictures as Victoire preened and posed before it. Unlike the glamour shoot, she wasn’t trying to be sensual. Nor was she trying to be quirky, or cute. She was just herself, in her world, without even clothes to hide any part of her from the lens. Bare before Teddy and his camera, she sat on her bed and pretended that he wasn’t there, that she was simply a girl caught in a daydream. Perhaps, Teddy thought, a girl caught in a daydream was all that she really was. Perhaps, she was just a daydream herself.

And he wanted her. He knew he was hard beneath his jeans, and he knew that she could see it.  He had found himself edging closer to the bed, ignoring the zoom function so that he had the excuse of moving the camera closer. Victoire watched him, her cherry lips parted and her eyes painfully blue. Gently, ever so gently, she placed her fingers on top of the camera and pushed it down, revealing his face.

Neither of them kissed the other first, but somehow their lips were together. The camera was pulled from Teddy’s suddenly limp fingers and placed on the nightstand, and then Victoire laced her fingers together at the back of his neck and pulled him to her. She kissed him, slow and sweet, and he felt like he was burning. The fire was not on his lips but deep within his chest, a dull roar that demanded he push her onto the bed and bury himself inside her. It was a primal instinct.

Yet, he made no move to act on it. He was wrapped up in the action of kissing her, of feeling her soft-like-silk lips move against his and her tongue teasing inside his mouth. Her fingers gripped the collar of the polo shirt that rose up from beneath his jumper, and they were tight enough to wrinkle the fabric as she brought him closer.

                Teddy joined her on the bed just to ease the awkwardness of their kiss, kneeling between her parted thighs. When he opened his eyes he could see all of her, willingly exposed to him. She was wet, the soft folds of her skin glistening, and Teddy’s exhalation was almost a whine of want.

They moved together, a single, sinuous being, and he lay between her legs. His weight was on her, pressing her against the mattress, and she was pulling at both layers of his tops at once, lifting the shirt and the jumper together. Her fingernails skittered across the skin of his stomach, raising pink lines that made his body jerk. His hips rocked instinctually against her and he listened to her quickening breaths beneath him as he helped her remove his clothes and cast them to the floor.

In only jeans now he lay back down with her, and the feel of her skin against his fanned the flames inside him. He had wanted this since he first saw her, but something about her had seemed untouchable. She was Snow White, a pixie and a princess, and she was not to be tainted.

But the princess didn’t seem to agree, because it was she who was now unbuckling his belt and fumbling with the buttons on his jeans, her breasts heaving with every shuddering breath she took. Her arousal was not quiet and nor was it subtle, and seeing her desire match his was more than Teddy would have ever thought to ask for.

Once Victoire had his jeans opened she pushed down the waistband of his boxers and pulled out his cock, stroking a few times so expertly along its length that it drew a moan from Teddy’s lips. Her eyes were bright and shining, and her lips had turned up into an almost manic, excited smile.

Without warning she flipped them over, straddling his hips with her body achingly close to his cock. She leaned down to capture him in a kiss that was filthier than he would ever have expected from someone who looked like Victoire, moving her tongue and her lips in ways he’d rarely experienced. Behind him, he heard the grind of wood on wood and then shuffling, and when Victoire sat up he saw she had fetched condoms from a drawer on her nightstand.

Her hands were practised and eager as she tore open one packet and slid the condom onto him. The box and empty wrapper were tossed to the floor, and they were kissing again, hungry and wanton. Teddy’s fingers were in her hair and on her shoulders, pulling her closer like he wanted to melt into her, closer than they could ever truly be.

“Do you want to?” He pulled away to pant. He was aching and desperate, but despite seeing this new side to her there was a part of his mind that still saw Victoire as a delicate faery.

“Guess.” She replied scathingly, and lifted her hips to impale herself on him.

                Victoire moaned low and Teddy made a hissing sound, his back arching at the sensation of being enveloped by tightness and heat. Her movements started quickly, bracing her hands against his chest as she lifted her hips and brought herself back down again, bouncing in his lap. She was gasping with every movement, but Teddy was too numbly surprised that this was happening- that he was having sex with Victoire, finally-to make any noises besides the occasional, slightly startled moan. He’d known that she could be sexy, he had seen it with his own eyes when they first met. Now he saw that assuming that sensuality had been an act was foolish, because here she was now, riding him and voicing her pleasure at doing so.

The long moments ticked by and the surprise began to wear off, prompting Teddy to reach forwards and steady Victoire with his hands on her hips. Her skin was warm to the touch- predictably so, judging by the sex flush spreading across it- and soft beneath his fingers. No longer needing to balance herself, Victoire raised her hands above her head, her fingers intertwining like threads in silk. Her eyes had fallen closed and her mouth was perpetually open in a continuous moan, the lipstick she had so carefully applied smeared across both her mouths. Her breasts bounced as she moved, and Teddy watched her, entranced by her beauty. He was sweating and so was she, the beads of moisture like dewdrops on her skin.

Now Teddy was sitting up to pulling her close, gripping her hip tighter with one hands whilst the other slid up her side, moving to cup her breast one by one, his thumb ghosting across her nipples. Likewise, Victoire’s hands came down from above her head. One moved to part her lips further, fingers playing harsh and fast against her throbbing clit. The other moved to cover Teddy’s hand, holding it firm over her thrumming heart.

The flames of the fire that had burned dully in his chest were roaring now, and they had moved to lick at the inner side of the skin of his stomach. That skin felt tight, and hypersensitive. He could no longer keep his eyes open to watch Victoire, so he buried his face in the place where her neck met her shoulder, planting kisses against it. Her cries were louder, higher, every time his hips thrust upwards to match her movements. Those movements were becoming messy and desperate, and they clung to each other like they were the last survivors of a shipwreck, adrift in the ocean with their hands crushed between them.

When Teddy came it was like seeing stars. The desperate tightness in his lower body vanished and he was bucking helplessly upwards into her, crying out as shivers ran the length of his spine. Lights danced behind his eyes. He could feel her hand between them, moving faster and faster even as he orgasmed until _yes, yes, yes, oh!_

                When they were spent, they didn’t collapse together onto the bed. They stayed sitting there, Teddy still in his jeans, and held each other while they caught their quietm wet breaths. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise for my lack of talent and writing smut.
> 
> It seems I can’t escape the trap of explaining all my pop culture references. Victoire’s cat is named after a character from Good Omens. The quote on her bedroom wall is from Paper Towns by John Green. The unintentionally gay vampires are The Lost Boys, and the other film referenced is Labyrinth.


	5. Teen Idle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"I wanna be a virgin pure  
>  A 21st century whore  
> I want back my virginity  
> So I can feel infinity."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I blame the time this chapter took on trying to sew a Karkat Vantas plush and also on rediscovering my love for roleplays.

Teddy just held her, then; he could smell her hair, and it smelt like lavender. But the flowers were artificial, the scent of shampoo. She was warm in his arms, breathing harder and faster than he’d seen her do so before as she came down from the high of the sex. The moment felt somehow precious to him, but it was over quickly; Victoire leaned away from him, pulling herself free of his arms and removing him from inside of her. She still panted, though.

“I’m going to go and clean up.” She said quietly, her fingers nervously combing through the blonde strands of her hair. Teddy simply nodded, his mind still slow and glazed over, numb with the aftermath of ecstasy. Still, he watched her as she got up from the bed and walked to the bathroom, dipping and staggering slightly on unsteady legs. He smiled lazily, and arrogantly- he knew he was good- then removed the condom from himself and tied it off, throwing it into the bin by the bed.

                Relaxing slightly on Victoire’s bed, Teddy fished around in the pocket of his jeans until he found his cigarettes and a plastic lighter. The pack had been crushed under Victoire’s weight while she rode him, but he managed to salvage one and light it up, taking a drag with a happy sigh. It occurred to him that she probably wouldn’t like him smoking in her room, but Teddy hadn’t gone without a post-shag cigarette since he was fifteen, and he didn’t plan to now.

He heard running water from the bathroom. It wasn’t the sound of a shower, just a tap that had been turned on, and Victoire returned to the bed in only a few minutes. She spared a moment to glare at Teddy’s cigarette before picking up the white nightdress from the floor and pulling it back on. Again, she was almost ethereal in her appearance. _I fucked a faery_ , Teddy thought, somewhat giddily.

                Victoire sat awkwardly on the edge of her bed. She faced away from Teddy, but she had her head turned so that she could see him out of the corner of her eye. The distance between them seemed enormous after they’d just been so close, an ocean made out of blue sheets.

"I've wanted to do that since we met." Teddy said finally, just to break the silence. Victoire coughed instead of replying, waving her hand slightly to clear some smoke. He felt stupid now, and selfish, for lighting the cigarette, but there was nowhere he could stub it out.

"What? Photograph me, or fuck me?" Victoire asked. Her laugh was small, but harsh and bitter. Teddy's brow creased in a frown.

"Both." He admitted with a shrug, faking nonchalance as he again brought the cigarette to his lips. "But- I mean, the shag was fantastic, but those photographs..." He shook his head, smirking. "They'll be amazing."

"You're very self-assured after sex." Victoire observed. She was smiling now, but only a little and only on one side of her face. Her eyes seemed a darker blue than usual. They were the colour of glass bottles, and they were almost sad. "You've still got your cock out."

Teddy glanced down.

"So I have." He said, carefully maneuvering to rectify that situation without horribly burning said body part with his cigarette. "There. It's away, so..." He paused, weighing the situation before he continued, "Why not come cuddle?"

Victoire laughed darkly again.

"I didn't think you were the cuddling sort." She told him, but she turned around to face him regardless, her pale legs crossed on the bed. He could have looked up her skirt from this angle, but it seemed pointless now. He'd been inside her, and now everything that she was seemed less mysterious, less intoxicating. He didn't want to touch her as much as he had an hour ago. It made him think back to her explanation of why she hadn't wanted to kiss him when they had first met, and he felt a stab of guilt in his gut.

"You're right. I'm not." He replied briskly. Victoire looked downward, picking at the hem of her dress. He wondered if it would be worth mentioning that, while that was true, he would love to cuddle with Victoire. However, he held his tongue in the end. Instead, he pointed out, "You seem upset."

Victoire didn't say anything, and Teddy frowned more deeply. The cigarette slowly burned away between his fingers.

"Do you regret sleeping with me?" He asked, sounding slightly fearful. Victoire sighed, her shoulders rising and falling slightly.

"Of course I do." She replied, and Teddy blinked. His eyes widened a little.

"I didn't think it was that obvious that you regretted it." He said. "I mean, I literally came about ten minutes ago. I didn't think it was possible for regret to set in that fast." He said dryly. Victoire shot him a sharp look.

"Clearly, you are not me." She pointed out. "Clearly, you don't have a boyfriend who's never been anything but good to you, who you just cheated on."

Teddy swallowed. He'd forgotten about Oscar- he wondered if he would want to beat Teddy up, when he found out. He'd certainly be able to.

"You don't have to tell him. Who says he has to know?" Teddy offered. Victoire gave him an incredulous look.

"That makes you sound like scum." She said bluntly, and really, he had to agree. "And anyway, him not knowing doesn't make me feel any less guilty." She sighed, hiding her face in her hands.

"Hey, at least you didn't sleep with a nineteen year old. I feel like a pervert." Teddy joked, knowing that it was the wrong thing to say the moment the words left his mouth. He'd never had a one night stand go this badly, this quickly. A quiet voice in the back of his head suggested it was because neither of them wanted it to be just a one night stand, and he almost hoped that it was correct.

Still, the way Victoire was glaring daggers at him made him think any chance he might have had at a real relationship with her had been dashed against the rocks now. There was something like dawning realization in her eyes.

"You bought the magazine, didn't you? The one you photographed me for?" She laughed again, incredulously this time. "That's so creepy."

Teddy frowned, hurt. Although he supposed he had hurt her, too, with what he'd already said. He refused to take responsibility for the sex, though, like she seemed to want him to. That had been all Victoire.

"They were my photographs." He defended himself, his voice beginning to rise. That only seemed to incense the model in front of him further.

"Wanking over your own work seems pretty egotistical." She snapped, and now he felt too far gone to try and explain that he only reason he'd bought it was because he missed her. He wanted to see her again, even if paper and ink was the only way. "I'm twenty-three, Teddy. Everything in those magazines is a lie. I thought you of all people would know that." She stopped dead in her speech, please taking a deep breath. "I think it would be best if you just left, now."

"I think I agree." Teddy replied coldly. He got off the bed, snatching up his clothes and belongings to put on and take with him (still fiddling around the cigarette). However, as he was walking to leave the bedroom, he glanced back over his shoulder for a moment and looked at Victoire, sitting there on the bed. Her expression was hurt, and distant, as she stared at the wall. He hated himself for thinking it, but she looked beautiful that way, like a sad doll. And again, he wanted to photograph her.

"Victoire?" He said, his voice soft again as regret began to creep in for snapping. Victoire looked at him, raising one eyebrow.

"Yes?" She prompted, not sounding as harsh as she had earlier either.

"The photographs..." Teddy began awkwardly. "I don't know what you'll let me do to them- the nude ones, especially. I was going to put them on my website, but..."

Victoire looked away again, her gaze downcast.

"Do what you want, Teddy." She said flatly.

 

***

 

"So basically, you fucked up?" James asked from the sofa he was sprawled across, laughing slightly. There was a half-smoked cigarette in one of his hands, and Loki and Hermes were sitting contentedly on his shoulder. Teddy had taken Puck from him when the lighter had come out, and was now letting the rat run over his hands as he recounted his sexual adventures and the aftermath of them to his god-brother.

"Basically." Teddy sighed heavily, frowning at James. "And you, you shouldn't even be smoking, you evil little git."

James laughed.

"I'm eighteen, I'll have all the tabs I like." He smirked, exhaling smoke in Teddy's direction. "You started smoking when you were younger than I was, too. Hypocrite." There was affection in their teasing, like brothers. They practically were brothers, now; Teddy barely remembered the six years of his life that James hadn't been in.

"We were both awful to each other, but I should have behaved better." Teddy shook his head sadly. "I don't think she'll ever want to see my face again, let alone talk to me."

"Do you give a shit?" James questioned, raising an eyebrow at Teddy. "I've seen the pictures on your site, and they're really good. _And_ you fucked her. It seems like a winning combination to me. Why does it matter if she hates you now?"

"Because I _liked_ her." Teddy said hopeless, after a few moments of searching for the answer. "I really did. I wanted to take her to dinner and kiss her goodnight and ask her to be my girlfriend. But I just turned her into another model to shag." He shook his head as if clearing the thoughts, smiling apologetically at James. "Anyway. Tell me about Albus. Is he still dating the Malfoy kid?"

 

***

 

"Did you honestly think I wouldn't see them?" Oscar sneered. He was a lot taller than she was, and more heavily built, but Victoire stood her ground and stared him down, her arms crossed defiantly over her chest. They were in his flat, and she just wished the fight was happening on her own turf.

"No, but I _honestly thought_ you wouldn't mind." She snapped. She felt like she'd been snapping a lot more since the night of the party, or maybe she was just noticing it now. Her mother had been short-tempered, too. It was her French blood that did it, Oscar had said. He'd found it endearing when they first met, but not now it was directed at him. "I'm a glamour model. I get photographed naked for a _living_. You've never had a problem with it before."

"You've never snuck out of a party with some poncy hipster before!" Oscar retorted. "A party, might I add, _I_ got you into- I'm trying to help you _out_ of glamour, Victoire, I'm trying to get you onto decent shoots."

"I don't need you using your influence to get me further into a career I hate anyway." She said. She had come to hate the day that she was scouted, sitting in her favourite tea room and re-reading _The Great Gatsby_. If she'd known was she was being recruited for, she'd never have let the money and exposure tempt her. Now she was too deep in to it to swim out. "I can handle myself just fine."

"Yeah, you can handle yourself well enough to let Lupin charm his way into your pants!"

Victoire stiffened. Oscar's eyes widened, and she recoiled slightly. If knowing about the pictures Teddy had taken of her made him this angry- well, at least she could understand his fury this time. But really, she could understand the anger over the pictures, too. It was different to the other shoots because it hadn't been organised, professional, and paid; and because there had been an electric chemistry between the people on either side of the camera.

"You really did sleep with him, didn't you?" Oscar sounded incredulous, and hurt. The hurt was what Victoire couldn't stand to hear. She'd thought she could love him, and it wasn't his fault she'd been wrong. That pity vanished at his next whispered words. "You dirty little _whore_."

Slapping him was a reflex. She yanked her hand back like it had been burned when she heard the sound of the blow, her eyes wet and horrified at herself. What she didn't expect was to be hit back, a punch with a weightlifter's strength behind it that sent her spinning to the floor. She held her hands out to catch herself and sent a jolt all up her arms, palms stinging and tears leaping to her eyes.

The sound faded back in after a moment, and she heard Oscar apologizing profusely- _oh, God, Victoire, baby, I'm sorry, so sorry_ \- and she believed the apologies. Today was the first time he'd ever even raised his voice at her. But the hit had put a shard of ice in her heart. She got up and dusted herself off, turned to face Oscar with her chin raised and jaw set.

"Thank you, for making my decision so easy." It was hard to maintain her image of independence and strength when she knew she looked so much like a pixie anyway, let alone when she was crying. "I don't think you'll want me around anymore anyway."

She turned on her heel and strode out of the flat, ignoring Oscar's protests. Only when she was out on the street did she soften and melt, hugging herself tightly and hiccuping, a fey girl who's wings had been grabbed and crushed.

 

***

 

When he was fourteen, Teddy thought it was impossible to ever get tired of seeing girls in their underwear. Ten years on, he’d proved himself thoroughly incorrect.

Somehow, the last shoot he’d done had been the final straw. The conventionally gorgeous girl with her bottle-blond hair and manicure paid for with her disappointed daddy’s money licking a lollipop for the camera had broken him. He was done with glamour. He couldn’t take it anymore- he couldn’t imagine anything so far removed from what he’d actually wanted to do with his life.

Victoire’s shoot with him had still been the closest thing to what he wanted to do. He still dreamed about her sometimes, wandering the woods in her white dress with dragonfly wings at her back. He missed her still, and regretted how they’d left things, but he’d had other girls in his bed in the months since he’d seen her and he’d once again forgotten the colour of her eyes.

It had been the photographs he’d taken of her that had contributed to his determination to leave glamour behind, and therefore, it had been her who had got him to go to that interview and land his new job. She was the reason he stood in front of his bathroom mirror now, running his fingers through newly-blue hair that he thought fit his current role more than mousy brown had.

Going to concerts with his camera and photographing bands for a music magazine was not the artsy, kitschy photography that he loved. Metal and the genres related to it was not the kind of music he liked. But it wasn’t glamour, and that was what mattered.

 

***

 

Victoire’s agent couldn’t explain the reason for her work drying up so suddenly, but she suspected it had something to do with her split from Oscar causing bad publicity. However much she hated her job, she still needed money, and backing out of modelling now would have felt like failure. Failure was the one thing that she wouldn’t have coped with. She needed to prove people wrong, everyone who had looked at her soft hands and her delicate face and saw nothing but a fragile flower to be fussed over and looked after.

It was that determination that had taken her to where she was then, smiling a glass-eyed smile and holding her legs open for the camera and hating herself all the way.

 

***

 

Teddy was covered from head to toe in a film of cold sweat as he shouldered open the door of his flat, but there was adrenaline flowing in his blood and he hadn’t felt so alive since the concert he’d been to last week. Metal wasn’t his thing but moshing was, and so were photographs. He was in love with his job and his life, and even if he hadn’t had sex in months he was truly happy. Still images of a singer mid scream, a guitarist’s fingers on the strings, held so much more truth and life than naked girls did. It wasn’t indie art, but it was beautiful in its own respect, and he loved it.

He grabbed a box of tissues as he sat down at the computer desk, unzipping his jeans as he scrolled through the first website that came to mind. Live music made him crave sex, but dancing to it made him too exhausted to find a girl, and besides the tiredness, he had a job to do.

Videos had never done it for him- the noises were too manufactured, and the positions looked painful. His old job had turned him off of glamour, but he wouldn’t turn down good, filthy porn. He stroked himself lazily as he looked through the glossy images of smiling girls, spread-eagled and obscene. He’d already settled on one image before he realised who it was, and the shock made him go limp in his hand.

Victoire didn’t look as beautiful when she was oiled and caked in makeup, and not when she was holding herself open and smiling blankly at the camera. He frowned, leaning closer to the monitor and swallowing as he inspected the photograph. He hadn’t known Victoire did porn now; he hadn’t know anything about her since the last time he’d spoken to her, almost a year ago now.

(Somewhere else, Victoire leafed through a magazine a friend had told her to pick up, and studied the photos and thought of the man who had taken them, and what he probably felt about them.)

He didn’t know it, but in different flats in different parts of the city, both Teddy and Victoire were wondering how things had gone so wrong for her, and so right for him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m not entirely sure how good I am at writing time-lapses, but I tried. I’m also not entirely sure if calling cigarettes tabs is a nationwide thing or not, but I went with it anyway. I always sort of imagined James Sirius to be incredibly alike both of his namesakes, in terms of personality.
> 
> IMPORTANT A/N EDIT: My original intent was to make this the author’s note on the new chapter, but pretty serious events in my home life have meant that I didn’t get a chance to write said chapter. I’m doing National Novel Writing Month during the whole of November, so this fic is on hiatus until December. I’m incredibly sorry, and even more so that I couldn’t give you all this notice with an update- hopefully, most people see it anyway.


	6. Cry Little Sister

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> " _Temptation heat beats like a drum  
>  Deep in your veins, I will not lie."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Your eyes do not deceive you, this chapter has been uploaded before. But I recognise it was really, really bad, and rushed; I hated it, and it didn’t do any of the things it needed to. So I wrote it again. It still isn’t perfect, but I like to think its better- and honestly, I think the things this chapter was supposed to be might be a little bit beyond my skill at this point in time.  
> But, as the previous said; new fandom (Attack On Titan), new stories to be written, I promise Wonderless will be finished very soon. Before Christmas. There are three chapters to go, maybe four if the next one ends up stretching on too long. A lot has to happen in it.

London was cold and wet. The rain pattered down from the sky in a weak drizzle, pooling shallowly on the pavement- enough to give the concrete a glassy sheen, but when Teddy walked through it there were no puddle to splash through.

Despite the miserable weather, the streets were crowded. His camera was safe hanging from its thick strap around his neck, but he kept it cradled close in his hands like a child anyway.

Even among the crowds on the high street, his sense of isolation was thick and pervasive. He’d come outside to take photos, but with so many people around it would be an impossible task. Still, grim determination refused to allow him to return, defeated, to his flat. On top of a job that included so much travelling, he rarely got time for recreational photography these days. That was, he supposed, another reason it was good he loved the photographs he did take for his job, full of blinding fuchsia and violet lights, people and sweat and life.

                Teddy’s eyes roamed the streets as he walked, drinking everything in hungrily. He viewed the world, as always, through a camera lens. His focus zoomed in on anything that he thought would make a good subject, even thought he knew there was nothing he could do about it at that moment.

His attention fell on a girl standing at the other side of the street, examining a shop window display of vintage-style clothes. She had her back to him, but nevertheless, his fingers itched for his camera. The umbrella above her head was off-white, edged with lace and so delicate that he would have mistaken it for a parasol if it hadn’t been raining. There was nothing special about her grey wool tights or oxford shoes- a typical hipster- or her pale blonde hair tied up in its messy bun (someone who’d just nipped outside quickly, soon to return home) but the magenta duffle coat she wore stood out in sharp contrast to the background against her. In the rain, London was all but monochrome, grey buildings and dark people below the great white sky. The girl was a splash of colour, a bright drop of blood on the skin of the city. That alone made Teddy think she was beautiful, in the way that deserved to be immortalized on film.

                The sense of recognition was slow and creeping, then it happened all at once.

Teddy had first heard about the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon when he was around nineteen years old- it had been one of the interesting little fact snippets that Lily Luna liked to dump on him at random moments. He didn’t know if it was applicable in this scenario, but it was the first thing that came into his head when he saw Victoire across the street just days after finding her photographs plastered all over the internet.

For a moment, he did nothing- nothing at all. The muscles in his body froze and his breath fell still in his tight chest. His mind was blank white, silently screaming and wondering what he was meant to do.

In the end, his reaction was pure reflex, with his brain taking no part in it at all. He raced across the street, misjudging how busy the road was and making frantically apologetic gestures at the taxi he dodged around. He called Victoire’s name once his feet hit the curb, but by the time she’d turned her hair and tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear, he was already standing in front of him.

He had forgotten the colour of her eyes again in the time they’d been apart. Looking at them now, wide in surprise, he didn’t know how he could ever have forgotten. He saw now that he got a chance to really study her face, she had changed in the year since he’d last seen her. Where she’d looked identical across the street, now he saw the ravages of the year upon her face. Her skin was still splattered with freckles, but there was thick winged eyeliner decorating her face now where before she had gone without makeup, and her lips were stained scarlet. She looked older, but in the sense that she had matured instead of aged. Where she had once been a pixie, she was now the queen of the fey.

But she was thinner now, but her breasts seemed bigger, and her hair had lost some of its lustre. More than that, her eyes were dead, mere chips of ice in the sockets. They barely even caught the light now, where when he’d first met her they had gleamed and shone with all the wonder that the city brought her. He wondered what exactly had happened to take those lights from her eyes, and he wondered, vaguely, how to bring them back.

“Teddy.” His name was a breath on her lips and it sent a shiver up his spine to hear it, calling back memories of her body on top of his, writhing and bouncing. The sheer _want_ that he harboured for Victoire made a sharp reappearance after withering and fading when they’d slept together, a stab of heat in the pit of his stomach.

“Your _hair_.” She continued with a nervous little laugh- it was blatantly obvious that neither of them knew what to do in this situation- her gaze flicking up to the top of his head.

“What about it?” Teddy blinked, suddenly fearful. It would be just his luck to have not noticed pigeon shit dripping down the back of his neck for the past hour.

“It’s blue.” She laughed again, shaking her head. “And spiky. It’s _blue_.”

                Teddy could hardly believe it. They had been a year apart, and, if he was honest with himself, that parting had not been on good terms. They had _fought_ , for God’s sake, spitting venom and throwing words like weapons. Their night together had destroyed Victoire’s relationship, and sometime since the last time Teddy had seen her she’d ended up in porn. And now he’d found her again, by chance in a city of millions of people, and they were talking about his hair. Not their lives, or the way hers had crumbled, or their fight or even fate, but his hair. Because it was blue now. Right.

He didn’t know what he’d expected, but it wasn’t this. When he’d failed to respond to her comment, the awkwardness in the air had grown thick and pervasive. It was the silence between two people who were far from strangers and had never quite been friends. It was the silence of two people who had known each other, and lost each other, and found each other again when they weren’t even sure they wanted to.

“Yeah. It fits my job better.” Teddy forced out, finally.

“Of course.” Victoire murmured. “You work for a music magazine now, don’t you?”

This was ridiculous. There wasn’t even just one elephant in the room. There were several, but how the hell were they meant to address them? It didn’t seem like Victoire was going to bring it up any time soon, and he didn’t expect her to.

He watched as she tilted her head up towards the sky, observing the grey clouds quietly while rain pattered and bounced off her umbrella; a picture of dainty elegance.

“It’s not letting up any time soon.” She observed, glancing at Teddy. “You’re soaked.” There was an unspoken observation at the end of her sentence- _you’re only going to get wetter, standing out here in the rain talking to me_.

“Yeah.” Teddy agreed with an awkward smile. “I should probably go home soon, actually, I’m not going to get any pictures taken like this.”

“Oh.” Victoire blinked, and he watched her face fall even as his heart rose slightly in his chest. Had she wanted to talk to him more?

“You can come back to my flat with me, if you want. For tea and stuff.” Teddy offered. Victoire blinked, and smiled faintly, looking down at her feet.

“The last time I saw you, you fucked me and treat me like shit.” She said bluntly. “And now you’re just inviting me home with you like you never did anything wrong?” She looked back up at him, and sighed. “But you know what? It was my fault too. Sure, let’s go.” There was another pause. “I have missed you.”

“I missed you too.” Teddy smiled.

 

***

 

The tube ride had been awkward and seemed a lot longer than it actually had been, and the silence persisted even as Teddy led Victoire up to his flat, his mind whirring with worries. He hadn’t had time to clean, and he knew what his bachelor pad would look like compared to Victoire’s clean, bright home. Besides that, he realised now what inviting her home would have sounded like- he honestly didn’t have sex on his mind. He didn’t _want_ to sleep with her again, he just wanted to talk to her. He had been honest when he said he missed her, a quiet ache in his bones that was so constant her hardly noticed it.

                Teddy couldn’t resist a grand, flowery ‘after you’ gesture as he opened the door to his flat, watching quietly as Victoire stepped inside and looked around, leaving her umbrella and coat by the door. He shifted awkwardly on the spot, thinking about what the flat would look like in her eyes; the bed unmade to one side of the studio room, dirty dishes piling in the kitchenette sink and clothes scattered on the floor. There were bits of string pinned to the walls and ceiling like washing lines, but instead of housing dripping wet fabric there were photographs pinned to them, his favourite ones that he’d taken. He was glad, now, that he’d never put Victoire’s up there; it hadn’t seemed right to do so. The models in those pictures were just that, but Victoire had always been far more to him. She wasn’t just a model. Teddy had no clue what they were to each other, but they were far from strangers. She meant something to him.

“Your photography is beautiful.” Victoire said, very quietly, from the middle of the room. She’d paused beside the sofa, looking up at the Polaroids and printouts.

“Thank you.” Teddy said, feeling knocked off balance by the compliment- he still didn’t expect Victoire to be nice to him.

“I’ve never really looked at it before.” She continued. “Not even the pictures of me. But these are incredible.” She reached up, tracing the lines of the face which took up one of the photographs.

“That’s my sister.” Teddy supplied. He saw no curiosity in Victoire’s face, but his photographs were important to him and he wanted to tell her about them. “God sister, anyway. Her name’s Lily.”

“She’s very pretty.” Victoire said with a faint smile, slowly turning around the flat, observing, until her eyes fell in the rat cage. Her eyebrows raised. “You keep rats?”

“Yeah.” Teddy beamed- his rats, he could talk about. They weren’t awkward like the events of the past year or deeply personal like his photographs. “Loki, Hermes, and Puck.” He rattled off their names. “Old gits, now.”

“I approve of the names. Have you always had rats?” Victoire bent slightly to peer into the cage, and Teddy was vaguely surprised that he didn’t feel any compulsion to look at her arse. Maybe glamour really had desensitized him, and maybe he just didn’t feel that way about her.

Maybe he just _cared_.

“No, but I’ve always had pets.” He shrugged. “Before these guys I had a snake.”

Victoire turned to walk back towards him, smiling faintly.

“I didn’t know you liked animals.” She said, briefly looking Teddy up and down. He bit his lip slightly, not entirely sure he liked the look in her eyes.

“Honestly, I don’t think we really know a lot about each other at all.” He pointed out, and Victoire nodded in agreement.

“I wish we did, sometimes.” She said, and stepped forward to shorten the distance between them, her hands grasping the lapels of his blazer. Her thumbs rubbed over the smooth, shiny surface of the various buttons which decorated it, smiling. “You’ve turned into a punk.”

Slightly uneasy with the contact, Teddy replied anyway,

“I guess I picked it up from work.” He laughed, watching Victoire’s fingers as they continued to toy with his clothes.

“It’s hot.” She said, and the word sounded alien on her lips. She stood on her toes, then, and kissed him firm on the lips while sliding off his blazer in one smooth motion.

“Hey, hey, hey.” Teddy protested, the first few repetitions of the word muffled against her lips before he detached himself from her embrace and moved away. “What are you doing?”

Victoire frowned.

“You invited me back to your flat. I assumed you wanted to have sex.” She said simply, and seemed even more confused when Teddy shook his head.

“I really don’t think you want that.” He said, his mind trailing back to the images he’d seen on a computer screen.

“Why?” Victoire frowned. “I’ve had sex with you before, and I don’t even have a boyfriend this time- I’m not going to regret it.”

“I saw what you did.” Teddy blurted, regretting bringing it up the moment that he did it. It had felt like things could go back to- not normal, there was no normal for them. But it had felt like they could maybe be friends until he brought this up. “The- the porn, I mean.”

Victoire blinked, just staring at him for a moment. Then her eyes widened, narrowed immediately after, and her face creased in anger.

“What?” She demanded, her hands balling into fists at her sides.

“I saw.” He repeated, and watched the blue fire slowly fade from her eyes to be replaced by mortification. She blinked, and the tears that had been brimming up in her eyes spilled over and rolled down her face. Now, Teddy was mortified too- he hadn’t had any idea of how this would go, he hadn’t had time to think about it. But the last thing he’d expected was to make her cry. It was also the last thing he’d wanted to do.

Without thinking about it, Teddy stepped forwards and pulled Victoire into a hug, kissing the top of her head as she buried her face in his shoulder and sobbed. He shushed her gently, murmuring things he hoped were soothing and rubbing her back until she began to calm down. It was the only thing he could think of to do when every pained sound she made hurt him too.

“I couldn’t get any other jobs.” She breathed when she’d finally calmed down enough to speak, looking up at Teddy. Her eyelashes were dark and spiky with tears, and he felt disgusting when he thought about how beautiful it made her look. He’d never seen her eyes so blue. “They were going to throw me out of my flat. I hate it- I hate that it’s out there now and I can never take it back, I hate that it feels like my body isn’t mine anymore. I hate _myself_ for doing it.”

“Being in porn doesn’t make you a bad person.” Teddy said. Even if he hadn’t meant it, he would have said it anyway. He would have said anything to make Victoire feel better.

“I don’t care.” She hiccupped softly. “I hate myself because I failed. At being an actress, and now even at being a model. I can’t do anything right.” She hid her face in her hands, taking a deep breath that sent a shudder through her frame.

Teddy’s heart ached for her. Gently, he curled his fingers around her wrists and pulled her hands away from her face so that he could look at her. The expression on her face was so heartbreakingly sad that he didn’t even think about studying the soft lines and creases of her face, or about how to best capture them on film. He just thought about how he could wipe that look away.

He bowed his head and kissed her face where the tears had touched her skin, brushing them away with his lips. Victoire’s hands slid up his back and into his hair, holding him close to her and pressing her soft body against his. She kissed him back when his lips reached her mouth, standing on her toes to do so. Instinctually, his arms wrapped around her waist, bunching her dress up around it. She was undeniably thinner than he had remembered her being, as fragile and light as a bird in his hands.

                They moved as one being towards Teddy’s bed, and when Victoire lay down on it he moved instinctually to cover his body with hers. His blazer was already gone, but he allowed her to remove the turtleneck he’d been wearing under it- it seemed only fair, when she was just in a dress.

Victoire’s hands trailed down Teddy’s chest, her lips parted slightly and red and swollen from the kissing. As he pulled him down to her again, she looked wanton, debauched in way that she hadn’t been when he’d seen her on that website. There was actual want and lust in her eyes.

                Her dress was discarded around the same time as Teddy’s jeans, and he held her against him as he reached around unclasp her bra. She was warm, her skin soft and smooth where he touched it as his hands ran down the curves of her sides. His hands hovered there, hesitant.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” He asked gently. “I understand if you don’t.”

In response, Victoire pulled him down by the hair and gave him a kiss which left his lips bruised and his head spinning.

“Yes.” She said, her voice definite and almost offended that he’d ever asked. “I _need_ this, Teddy. To feel normal. To prove my body is still mine.” The last part was softer and quieter, a secret never shared before.

Her bra fell away, lilac silk in his hands, but her breasts remained perky and undeniably larger than the last time he’d seen her naked, silicone hiding as a secret inside her skin. He wondered if she’d had it done for the glamour or the porn, and wondered still why anyone thought she needed it when he saw every part of her as perfect already.

Victoire relaxed on the bed, and Teddy ran his hands reverently over her skin. Their last time together had been so rushed and sudden that he hadn’t had time to enjoy her. This was sudden too, but slower, and infinitely more intimate. Teddy held himself up over her, kissing her neck gently and hearing her breath escape as a sigh in response. He allowed himself to glance at her face, her eyes flickering beneath their closed lids.

His lips kissed a line down to her breasts and lingered there for a moment, his tongue flicking at one of her nipples, before he continued down. He came to rest between her legs, lying there comfortably and looking up at her body. He saw all of her, expanses of pale skin endless as sand in the desert and the freckles like constellations on her shoulders. He had a wild though that he loved her, but he knew it wasn’t true.

Victoire’s underwear was black lace, and he found it somehow endearing that it didn’t match her bra as he slipped it off. She had shaved since the last time, missing the blonde curls he remembered, but he’d known that from the website.

There was a moment in which neither of them moved, Victoire looking down at him and he up at her, before he bowed his head, closing his eyes and licking a line up between her lips. Her breath hitched in response.

Encouraged, Teddy used his fingers to gently part her lips so that he could gently flick his tongue against her clit. Her hips twitched under his hands, and he heard the slight rustle of his bed sheets as she grasped them. He continued the movements of his tongue, lapping steadily but tantalisingly slowly. Occasionally he dipped his tongue down to slip inside her, and she would gasp softly ever time, and moan when he moved back up to her clit.

Victoire’s moans heightened in volume and frequency. Teddy’s hands were on her thighs now, holding her up and open as his head moved between her legs. They trembled in his hands, her toes curling until she was bucking her hips helplessly and crying out as she came undone.

                Teddy wiped his mouth and took a breath before he moved back up, settling on top of Victoire and staring into her glazed eyes. Their bodies fit together perfectly, like the final pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.

“No one’s done that for me in a very long time.” She murmured, her voice low and dreamy post-orgasm.

“You deserve it.” Teddy said simply, easing out of his boxers as best as he could. Somewhat awkwardly, he reached past Victoire to grab the condoms kept by his bed, half sitting up as he slicked one on. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I promise you,” Victoire reached up again, wrapping her arm around Teddy’s neck as he fingers tangled in the blue hairs at the nape. She pulled him down, not for a kiss but just so that their faces were close to each others, their breath mingling in the humid air. “I want this more than anything.”

                Teddy held himself in one hand as he guided himself inside of her with a quiet groan, hearing her hissing breath in response. It went in easily, and his eyes fluttered shut at the sensation of tight heat surrounding him. He tried to steady himself, hold his weight up above her, but Victoire wouldn’t let him; she stopped him moving away, holding on to his back and his neck and keeping them in contact at every point along their body. Skin against skin, he couldn’t believe how soft she was.

The motions of his hips as he thrust into Victoire were slow but deep. His eyes remained closed, but even if he couldn’t see the look on her face he could hear the sound of her breath hitching and soft moaning as he moved; his body grinding against her clit every time. He had never had sex like this before, slow and intimate like a slow burn in his stomach. It _was_ slow, even when he did speed up. Victoire’s legs were hooked over his hips, wrapped around him like an embrace as she clutched at his back, tugged at his hair. Her face was buried into his neck, kissing and biting with little pinpricks of pain which added a sharpness to the pleasure that each thrust brought him.

His climax had seemed to be forever in the making, and he saw stars when it happened, a blinding white explosion in the pit of his stomach; the sparks of which reached his heart. He heard, but not saw, Victoire cry out alongside him as they came together. In that moment, they were as one being, inside and around each other and clutching at their skins like drowning sailors out at sea.

                He opened his eyes, then, gazing down at her in something akin to wonder. Her hair splayed out around her head like a halo on the pillow, pupils of her eyes blown wide with ecstasy, she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

They fell asleep like that, their legs tangled intimately together like the roots of trees.


	7. Wonderless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> " _And if you don't find me on the front page  
>  Find a way to say that you saw me  
> And if you don't find me in a movie  
> Find a way to say that you knew me._"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been looking forward to this chapter since I started planning the fic, and it was easy and fun to write- just hard to actually sit down and focus on, probably because a crossover fic I’m also writing has completely taken over my mind. Also maybe because I saw Frozen on its opening night here (Friday) and haven’t stopped thinking about it since. Elsa’s a babe.

It was still dark when Teddy woke up, and the normal late-night quiet still pervaded his flat. However, he could hear something more than just the regular ambient sounds of his rats in their cage- a soft shuffling, someone moving around in the darkness.

He half sat up, and when his eyes adjusted to the darkness he saw a pale figure moving in the gloom, dressed again and lacing up one of her shoes. It was dark in the room, but the city lights shone through the gaps in his blinds and lit up her pale hair.

“Victoire?” Teddy frowned, his voice still rough with sleep. “Are you leaving?”

Victoire went utterly still when he spoke, and it took several long moments for her to turn her head and look over her shoulder at him. Her hands still held the laces of her boots.

“I want to go home, Teddy.” She said simply. There was a strange undercurrent to her voice, something deeply and achingly sad.

“It’s late.” Teddy pointed out, glancing at the clock by his bed. “Really late. Just… wait until morning, okay? I’d feel better knowing you weren’t wandering the streets at night.”

“I don’t need your babying.” He’d expected harshness in her voice when she said it, but there was none. “I mean I want to go _home_. Leave London and go back to my parents.” She crossed her arms over her chest and hunched over, but she still angled her body so that Teddy could see her face. “The city’s beaten me, I think I have to accept that now. Don’t you ever get homesick?”

Even in the midnight gloom, he could still see how blue her eyes were.

“Not really.” Teddy replied guardedly. “I mean, this is home to me. I’ve lived here for years.”

“You never even miss your family?”

“Not really.” Teddy repeated, after a moment. “I mean, all I’ve got is my gran. And my godparents and their kids, but they live in London anyway.”

“Ha.” Victoire laughed softly. “Can I call you lucky, for that? My family’s huge, and I have my little brother and sister looking up to me. They’d be so ashamed.” She hugged her legs, tucking her knees up to her chest, and Teddy didn’t care enough to complain about her shoes on the sheets. The hem of her dress came up as she did so, exposing the pale skin of her thighs.

“They shouldn’t.” He told her gently. “You only did what you had to do.”

“You wouldn’t be saying that if you were the one with your cunt all over the internet.” Victoire’s laugh was as harsh as her language, and Teddy blinked in surprise.

There was near silence, for a handful of uncomfortably long moments. The only sounds were those of their bodies occasionally shifting on the bed.

“How did you lose your parents?” She finally asked, and Teddy was surprised by her yet again. It was the question on everyone’s lips once they heard he’d lived with his grandmother, but most people waited until they were absolutely sure his parents were indeed dead before they asked. Then again, he’d always seen a quiet, sharp cleverness in Victoire’s eyes. She wasn’t the type to need confirmation once she’d figured something out.

“It was a car accident.” Teddy answered. He spoke slowly, but without the hesitation that usually accompanied this topic. He could have poured his heart and soul out into Victoire’s ears and not cared at all. “They’d left me with my gran while they went out for dinner and some drunk driver ploughed into them on the way home.”

“I’m sorry.” It was the first time Teddy had ever heard someone say that and sound like they meant it. Still, he shrugged.

“I was a baby.” Teddt said. “I know I should still be sad about it, and when I was younger I was, but never… I just can’t miss people I never knew. All I ever had of them were the stories my gran told me.”

Victoire nodded in understanding.

“Can I hear those stories?” She asked cautiously.

“Come back to bed.” Teddy requested instead of answering, and he felt his heart lift when she actually did; folding her dainty frame into his arms and curling up against him, the fabric of her dress scratchy against his bare skin.

Teddy cleared his throat, his hand stroking and combing through her hair as he held her. These were tales not often told, anecdotes passed from his gran and his godfather for his ears only, so that the last Lupin could somehow know his parents. There was no way Victoire could fathom the trust implicit in the words he was about to speak. He cherished them, other people’s memories of his parents, and he kept them closely guarded.

“My mum’s name was Nymphadora.” Teddy began, and laughed when Victoire raised an eyebrow. “My gran’s family has a long and rich tradition of dumb names. People just called her Tonks- that was her maiden name. In every picture I’ve ever seen of her she’d had a different hair colour and a rock band shirt, and everyone said she was funny and brave and rad as hell.” They both laughed, then.

“I guess the punkiness is in your blood.” Victoire teased. Teddy beamed, but privately he thought that it was Victoire who had gotten into his blood and his bones, infecting him.

“I guess so. My dad was different- they were a pretty odd couple, I think. He was older, and he was teacher- huge bookworm, as well, my gran still has all the ones he owned.” He’d tried reading most of them, when he was a little boy still trying to be closer to a father he would never know.” He used to be a prankster, apparently. Him and his friends were the terror of their teachers, but they all died younger than he did.”

                He paused to look down at Victoire. She was watching him with serious eyes, her lips closed. He kissed them.

“I think we should make this into a trade.” He suggested. “My stories for one of yours.”

“I think that sounds fair.” Victoire nodded, shifting slightly in Teddy’s lap. Her chin was bony and dug into his sternum, but he didn’t complain. “Okay. How about, ‘how we got here’?” She asked.

“Uh, sure.” Teddy replied, quizzically raising an eyebrow. Victoire simply smiled at him.

“You know I wanted to be an actress.” She said, speaking quietly. “It’s hard to break into. I’ve been in a couple things, but they were minor roles and it never really… _happened_ , for me. But a couple of years ago, my agent got me an audition for a production of _Rocky Horror_ \- as Columbia.” She looked down, laughing bitterly. “I’m the first to admit that I’m something of a snob. I refused to go- I didn’t think it was a sophisticated enough role. After that, I just stopped getting auditions altogether, and that’s when I had to go into glamour.” She glanced at Teddy again, steadily meeting his gaze. “Whenever bad things happen to me, I bring them on myself. I’m not good enough, and I’m greedy.”

“I don’t think you are.” Teddy disagreed instantly. Victoire leaned away from him then, frowning while her eyes looked sad and almost disappointed.

“This is the problem I’ve always had, when it comes to you.” She pointed out gently, tucking her hair back behind her ear. “You think I’m beautiful, so you refuse to believe that there’s anything bad about me even when you know and I know that there is.” She shook her head. “It’s one of the reasons I haven’t tried pursuing a relationship with you. You only like this two dimensional image you have of me.”

“Does being brutally honest count as a character flaw?” Teddy asked dryly, although he didn’t entirely mean it. The flat was dark and silent aside from their voices, the only lights were the headlights on the road below and glow of the buildings across the street that slipped in through the curtains. It was the witching hour; the time for honesty and for secrets to be told because the darkness was sure to keep them, and they would never be repeated come dawn. He couldn’t blame her just because the one she’d spoken had been unpleasant. No one could lie at this time of night.

“I don’t like liars.” Victoire shrugged, but she settled herself back against Teddy anyway, so she couldn’t have minded them that much. He resumed his stroking of her hair, his touches as hesitant and soft as they were intimate. This was not an hour for lying, and there was no denying that there was _something_ between the two of them. They were less and lovers and (despite what Victoire may have said) most likely less than friends, but they were _something_. They were tied together by a scrap of scarlet string that wasn’t as fragile as it seemed to be.

And Victoire still had the kind of beauty that it was Teddy’s instinct to immortalize.

“Hey,” Teddy said after a while, prompting Victoire to look up at him. “I understand if you want to go home and never see me again after this, but… I’d really like to take some photographs of you.”

“You already have.” She pointed out, seeming more like she was genuinely confused than she was trying to be a smart-ass.

“Different ones, though.” He explained. “No nudity, but costumes, and scenery, and stories behind the picture. It’d still just be me and you doing it, and they’d still just go up on my website, but I want to do something more _concrete_.” It was the only way he could think of to describe it. He’d loved their organic shoot in Victoire’s flat, not least of all because of how it ended, but he wanted something more.

“I think that sounds good, Teddy.” Victoire replied after taking a short time to think about it, and Teddy felt like his smile could have split his face.

 

***

 

The shoots happened in a way that seemed slow to Teddy, but quickly for Victoire. They exchanged phone numbers for the first time, out of convenience, but to his surprise he never felt the need to call her for anything other than to schedule another shoot. They happened, usually, at least once a week, and Teddy adored them. He was utterly convinced that he was taking the best photos that he ever had. The shoots would last a day, generally, with texting beforehand so Teddy could tell Victoire what the backdrop would be and give her an idea of what she should wear, but he trusted her enough to let her put the final touches on her clothes and makeup. She always looked stunning, and she always fit the setting.

                In the woods, light filtered down through the leaves to illuminate her blonde hair. She was dressed as a mori girl, in a lace shirt layered over an eggshell blue dress and a tulle white skirt underneath, heaped with scarves and a dream catcher necklace. There was a flower in her hair, one Teddy had seen as they walked through the underbrush and immediately snatched up to tuck behind her ear. Her fingers had brushed against the back of his hand, and he had ignored the fluttering of his heart in favour of capturing her leaning against a tree, or cross-legged on the ground, her hands filled with bracken and dead leaves.

                The trek to the beach for the next shoot was long, and they couldn’t last long in the cold and salty air, but Teddy loved the photos. Victoire wore the same white dress she had for that shoot in her flat, but now it was soaked through and clinging to her skin- it wasn’t lewd, but an honest representation of the curves of her body. Her hair was damp, her lips flushed. Her fingers curled in the sand and flecks of it worked all the way up her arms, disguising themselves among her freckles. Every picture he took had her sprawled half in and half out of the ocean, the look in her eyes making him think of a mermaid startled to find herself on land.

                It was dawn when they found themselves on the roof of Teddy’s building. Victoire had called him to propose this shoot. She’d been wandering her usual selection of vintage and antique shops and stumbled across a pair of costume angel wings she could have sworn had been stolen from real swans. The feathers were ruffled and dirty, and Victoire wore them on her back in a muddy dress and bare feet, perched delicately and dangerously on the edge of the rooftop with her face turned up to the sky. Most of the photos showed her crouched and broken like a fallen angel, but Teddy’s favourite was the one where she stood in front of the sun, fingers outstretched and up on her toes like a bird about to take flight.

                She was a dead princess, a mermaid, a faery, but most of the time she was simply a breathtakingly beautiful girl. He photographed her in forests and beaches and old, abandoned buildings, or simply in his flat, or on the street when he took her for coffee. The lighting was always soft and flattering, and the pictures were free of effects. It was simply Victoire, in whatever costume with whatever props they had to hand, and he loved them. His mind spun with the stories he could think of whenever he looked at the photographs.

                The shoots stopped happening, eventually, when he had taken all he had to take. Somehow, he could no longer bring himself to text her. After the breathtaking art they’d created together, calling her just to ask her out to coffee seemed meaningless, tacky. When he finally got the courage to do it, weeks- months- later, her number had changed, and he ended up talking to a very confused Chinese takeaway.

He uploaded the pictures to his website, on a page away from his regular portfolio- he felt like they deserved more than that. There was a spark of something inside him when he did it; anticipation, maybe. He knew that, perhaps for the first time, he had made something truly special, and he didn’t know how people might react to it. Victoire’s name was up on the page with his, tying them together even now they’d lost touch yet again. Her face stared out at him from the screen, one of the pictures taken on the beach. He was reminded of when he’d found her again on that street in the rain, walking alongside her and realising how the lights had left her eyes. He thought about her words to him in that intimate night they’d never spoken of again, about how the city she’d once been in awe of, once adored, had beaten her down. Broken her.

There was a dark thing inside Victoire, and it had only grown since he’d known her. It had changed her, and perhaps it had taken that awe and innocence from her.

He called the album of images Wonderless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing this chapter taught me that Microsoft doesn't consider 'cunt' an actual word and will try to correct it.  
> I wanted to talk a bit about the process of incorporating the magical aspects of Harry Potter into a Muggle setting. Tonks and Remus are killed in a car accident because in the series itself, when James and Lily are murdered by a dark wizard, that is the mundane explanation given for it. Harry and his family would live in London because if he worked for the government there, he would have to. Tonks dyes her hair frequently because in the books she can change it at will- the same reason Teddy's hair colour has changed over the course of this fic.  
> Two chapters to go, kids.


	8. Hero

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> " _I'm the hero of this story  
>  Don't need to be saved."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, readers who somehow haven’t left me! Long time no see!  
> It’s no secret that Wonderless isn’t the only fic I’m working on, but that’s not really the reason I took so long to update. I’ve been incredibly busy over the Christmas period, on account of the fact that a lot of my gifts to people were hand sewn by me, so I had to make those, and then I ended up writing one of my friends a short story which spun wildly out of control and ended up at 7,000+ words.   
> Regardless, I’m here now, and I’ve brought the penultimate chapter with me.

The sound of the phone ringing was shrill and irritating to the point that it almost disgusted Victoire. She almost didn’t pick it up.

Then again, she didn’t have much of a choice, especially when she didn’t even know how important the phone call might be. Sighing heavily, she tossed the notepad she’d been scribbling on to one side along with her pencil, which made a soft, wooden noise as it hit the paper. There were words in that notebook, short stories about beaches mermaids and princesses lost in the forest for so long their dresses began to rot. For all she wished it, she’d never been a very good writer, but she thought of the characters that had been inadvertently created when she took those photographs with Teddy, and she had to write their stories down somewhere.

Her feet were bare, and she daintily picked her way through the floor towards the phone, stepping over the spot where Aziraphale was squirming around aimlessly.

“Hello?” Victoire said into the phone, schooling her voice to be polite and pretty even if she wanted to complain at them for disturbing her. She’d been having a perfectly nice time on her own; there was an abandoned slice of cake left balancing on the arm of the sofa she’d been sat in. It was the first time she’d indulged in anything like cake in months. Since her work had begun to dry up, leaving her seriously worrying about money, she’d begun to understand why so many models she saw at shoots were often discussing diet fads, having the self control not to eat, or the ways they could make themselves sick. Once it had been off-putting (she could have, should have tried to help, but Victoire wasn’t that kind of person- she just wanted to be left alone), but now there was an insidious little voice in the back of her head that wondered idly if she’d get more jobs if she lost her curves. That voice, recognising how dangerous it was, was one of her reasons for her most recent decision about her career. So she would have cake, even if she had to pick the crumbs off her bare legs where she’d been lounging around in just her underwear and a jumper so old she didn’t remember buying it.

Her eyes scanned her flat for a moment, flickering from wall to wall. It was a different place to the one she’d brought Teddy back to- God, well over a year ago now. It seemed ridiculous that he’d been in her life that long, but she’d met him only a handful of times. He was an oddity, crude and the most boyish person she’d ever met in her life, but she liked him despite herself. The only reason she didn’t chase him down was the knowledge that despite all the charm of his crooked smiles, he could be so very bad for her. That he didn’t like her at all, but this caricature of her he had conjured up for himself in his head.

Still. This flat wasn’t the one that Teddy had known. It was smaller, with only two separate rooms including the bathroom. She could see her whole life, from her kitchenette with pale pink plates in the sink to her perfectly-made bed, in one cramped room. She’d always been one for cosy spaces, but that was almost depressing.

Not that it mattered anymore. She’d called her parents the day before to let them know she was selling her flat and coming home. All her life, all she had ever wanted to do was get away from the confines of Shell Cottage and the tiny coastal village it belonged in, where everyone knew everyone’s business and people were too backwards to accept the fact that Dominique was gay. Well, she’d done that now: she had lived and loved in the big city, and it had ruined her. London had torn her down piece by piece and ground her into the cigarette-studded pavements, and even if she hated the idea of going home it was the only thing she could do. She frightened herself with the thoughts of what she might do otherwise.

“Victoire?”

                Victoire straightened up abruptly, all thoughts that her flat stirred up banished from her head. She nervously tucked her blonde hair behind one ear, biting down on her lower lip. The voice on the other end of the phone was her agent, the one she hadn’t walked away from just yet despite her imminent abandonment of London and all her hopes about becoming an actress. There was a tiny part of her, the remnants of the little girl with all her books who just wanted to play Juliet, refused to let her do it just yet.

“Yeah? Oh my God… no, no, that’s great! I’ll- huh… yeah, no, I’ll definitely be there, that’s fantastic, thank you so much.”

She put the phone back down in its cradle, handling it as gently as a baby bird, and then brought her hands to cover her mouth.

She had a job offer. An actual person wanted them to model for her- not with her clothes off, not trying to titillate, but just showing off some clothes. She could get paid, good money, for something that she didn’t mind- sometimes even enjoyed- doing.

Maybe she wouldn’t have to leave London just yet, after all.

 

***

 

Teddy kicked the door to his flat shut with more force than would ever be necessary, damn near leaving a dent in the wood before he stalked away to throw himself on his bed. He still had his boots on, dragging mud all over his sheets, and he didn’t care in the slightest. Even hearing the snuffling of his rats going about their business in the cage didn’t help like it normally would; today it just reminded him that they were getting old, and soon they would die and he would be completely alone.

                He knew he was exaggerating. Not having a girlfriend didn’t mean he was completely alone, because he still had his family and his friends. But for just one day, he wanted to be dramatic about things. He felt like he was owed that, at least.

He lifted his head from the pillow to stare at his fingers where they were twisted and curled in his bed sheets, tiny slivers of matte black polish still clinging to them. He wanted to tear them off, to go out and buy the first brown hair dye he laid his hands on and abandon this idiotic punky-indie-rocker look he’d been carrying for God knows how long. He loved it, but…

They’d fired him. They’d fucking fired him, and now he didn’t know what to do.

                In one sharp movement, Teddy snatched his pillow up and pressed it to his face so it would muffle the explosive scream he let loose. He could feel himself shaking, trembling with anger. He couldn’t believe what had just happened- for the first time in a long time, he had truly loved his job. He’d been getting fantastic feedback from people who’d seen and loved Wonderless. He’d been happy and financially secure, and he’d been finally forcing himself to look into dating people that weren’t Victoire. Now he’d lost that.

He’d have to go back to glamour, or something. The idea of it turned his stomach, and he lowered the pillow so he could stare over the top of it at the spot on the door he’d kicked. Even after the long, long break he’d taken from it, the idea of going back to that industry made him want to cry. He was just too tired of it.

Besides that, everything about glamour was tainted now with Victoire. She had wormed her way into it like she had the cracks in his brain, filling up the empty spaces. There were some nights when he felt like he lived and breathed Victoire, the memories of the time he’d spent with her and the whispered secrets they’d given to each other when they lay in bed, the stories told outside coffee shops in the afternoon sun. She was a part of his life now even though she wasn’t in it, irrevocably and forever, and he hated it. He didn’t want to be forced to miss her, just a little, like pricking his fingertips with a needle, every time he picked up a camera. He wanted her to be his completely, or he wanted her to be out of his life properly. Having to think about her constantly was a torture, but he didn’t think she was the kind of person it was possible to forget. Enigmatic and beautiful, she left a part of herself in everything that she touched.

                “Stop it.” He muttered to himself, yanking the stained and faded pillow back up to his face. He had more important things than Victoire to think about, like what the hell he was actually going to do for money now and whether he could plead for his old job back. She needed to stay exactly where she was, locked up in a box at the back of his brain.

 

 

***

 

Her hair was in large, loose curls again, the way it had been the first time she’d ever met Teddy. Except this time, she had more clothes on than a cheap silky robe covering considerably more expensive silky underwear. She had on denim shorts paired with black knee socks, and a leather jacket over a t-shirt bearing an odd, psychedelic print. There was a beanie in her hair and canvas trainers on her feet. It was the type of thing she would never normally wear, the type of thing that made her look like a girl Teddy would have on his arm (why was it, she wondered, that her thoughts always came back to the boy with blue hair?) but it was, apparently, what was in fashion at the moment. Victoire didn’t have to like it, she had just had to wear it well.

                She’d posed and preened in that outfit for what felt like forever, and before that there had been different ones- ironically ugly jumpers and skinny jeans, denim vests and torn leggings. For every one she’d stood in front of the camera, pulling at her clothes, legs spread in a confident pose, faking a laugh so seamlessly that it seemed real.

It took a while, getting back into the swing of modelling like this. The last work she’d done in front of a camera had been Wonderless- a name she was frustrated she’d had no part in- and that had been completely different to this. Organic shoots with a photographer she’d once considered a friend, once entertained the idea of falling in love with, was a whole world away from bright lights and a stranger who only spoke to her to ask her to change up her pose.

But it was good. Different was not bad. She was actually getting paid for these latest shoots she’d been hired for, and her picture was around shopping centres and in catalogues and magazines instead of just stagnating in the internet portfolio of a silly hipster she’d once had a crush on. She wondered when he’d become that, someone that she thought of in affectionate terms instead of the awkward, camera-obsessed little boy who made her behave like a reckless fool.

Regardless, she was better now. She was no longer in danger of losing her flat, and she didn’t even have to take her clothes off. It wasn’t acting, and it wasn’t a fulfilling job, but she had money now. If she went back home with a slightly hollow feeling in her chest and drifted through the high street like a ghost, isolated from others by force of her own introversion, what did it matter? She would be fine, she was sure of it.

                Truly, her only regret were the small traces of Teddy left in her life. She knew full well, after conversations with some of the people who’d hired her, why work had picked up again. People were seeing Wonderless, and they loved it- she could only imagine all the job offers Teddy must have had rolling in. So she hated him for it, a little bit. She hated that it was him who’d saved her from having to leave London, rather than her saving herself. She was not a damsel in distress and she never would be, no matter what he might have thought of her. She wanted to be strong, on her own two feet, and she wanted to hate herself.

Finally, she was coping again, but it was such bittersweet relief.

 

***

 

He was in Primark when he saw her, trying to find the cheapest pair of skinny jeans he possibly could. Work had been awful lately. Unable to bring himself to go back to being a glamour photographer, he’d taken up a job selling semi-popular CDs in a music store. It was boring, inane work that paid like shit and didn’t really ease his money worries, but at least it was something.

Apparently, Victoire was a lot better of than she was. She was on one of the screens in the store, the ones that showed constantly looping videos of models in the clothes being sold. In a sundress and a tan duffel coat, she smiled and bounced around on the screen, a pixie made of light and pixels. He stood there for a moment, transfixed with his mouth slightly open. It had to be the biggest coincidence in the world, seeing her like this- but, was it? She was a model. Of course he would see her modelling.

He hadn’t even known she’d gone into clothes modelling, glad as he was she seemed to have managed to break away from porn and glamour. It was jarring, seeing her after the time he’d spent trying to forget she was still out there somewhere despite not being a present part of his life anymore.

                Absently, he began to wonder if the industry advertising clothes had any room for new photographers.

 

***

 

Victoire woke up in bed next to a man, and sighed. She supposed he was her boyfriend now, the first one that she’d had since Oscar all that time ago. They’d certainly been seeing each other long enough, now- two months after they’d met, with him being a photographer at a shoot.

It reminded her too much of Teddy. There it was again, that resentment, that tiny hate that he had ingrained himself so deeply in her mind. At least she could console herself with the fact that his behaviour had made it seem as though she’d done the exact same to him.

                She would probably break up with this new man, soon. Try as she might, she couldn’t invest herself in the relationship. She could invest herself in very little lately, except the re-reading of beaten (well-loved, she called them) paperbacks and trying to decorate her flat so it seemed a little more like her home, instead of a halfway house she was only inhabiting as long as she had to. Even if she was happier now, a lot of her life had come to feel like that. Temporary, empty, and unimportant.

 

***

 

For some reason, standing at the shoot which was to be his first foray into this kind of photography, Teddy had expected Victoire to be there. Honestly, he felt like it wasn’t even an unreasonable assumption to make. So many times, they’d run into one another on pure coincidence- at the party, when he’d seen her on the Internet, in the street, her video in that shop the other week. Everything they were was coincidence, and it stood to reason that this would be another one.

                Instead, the girl he was photographing was redheaded and voluptuous, with eyes like emeralds. She was beautiful, but she was not Victoire. The girl who looked like a faery had ruined him forever, he thought. He would spend the rest of his life comparing girls to her and finding that they all fell short.

        He thought of Victoire after the shoot, when he was back home and lying in his bed. He thought of the way that he always lost her, no matter how much the universe conspired to bring them back together. He'd never managed to hold on to her, not once. Every time they'd met, she'd slipped through his fingers like smoke and was carried away on the wind. Victoire was a dream to him, and always would be.

And maybe that was for the best. It was easy to yearn for an ideal, but loving a girl took time, effort, commitment. He didn’t know if he was ready for that, if he was mature enough.

He felt like Victoire deserved more than he could ever give her. He felt like she agreed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t know if I really like this chapter or I really don’t, but either way I don’t think I’m ever going to go back and fix it like I did with Chapter 6, because I’ve never been good at time lapses and I never will be. This chapter itself takes place over the course of several months, the better part of a year.  
> Another thing I tried to do with Victoire’s parts was highlight the fact that Teddy is a silly little boy. Because he is. It’s not something I really get to show with this fic, because it’s mostly from his point of view and he doesn’t see himself like that, or think the way he views Victoire is unrealistic and problematic. Which it is.


	9. Shake It Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _And I am done with my graceless heart, so tonight I'm gonna cut it out and then restart._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I could make explanations for why this took so long or the mediocrity of this chapter, but I won’t.  
> I will say, in case any of you haven’t noticed, that every chapter of this fic has been named after a song that meets two criteria: It fits the story, and its something Teddy or Victoire would listen to. Said songs are, if anyone doesn’t know/is interested,  
> 1\. Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want- The Smiths  
> 2\. There Is A Light That Never Goes Out- The Smiths  
> 3\. Mr Brightside- The Killers  
> 4\. Violet- Hole  
> 5\. Teen Idle- Marina and the Diamonds  
> 6\. Cry Little Sister- Gerard McMann  
> 7\. Wonderless- Pierce The Veil  
> 8\. Hero- Regina Spektor  
> 9\. Shake It Out- Florence and the Machine
> 
> Also, I want to suggest people go back and skim the first chapter so you can see what I was trying to do with the beginning of this one. But I won’t.

Teddy had set his alarm for nine in the morning, but had managed to sleep through it on account of the sound being muffled by his pillow. As such, he didn’t actually roll out of bed until around noon.

“It’s too early for this.” He muttered to himself, running long fingers through his hair (still electric blue even after all his months away from the magazine) and glancing absently around his flat. It was a studio, tiny and somewhat scruffy for all the years it had been his home; but the bed was mostly made even though he’d just slept in it, and the dishes in the sink were at a manageable height. The artwork on the walls was hung straight, and the calendar was on the right month even if he hadn’t been ticking off the days. The rat cage was still completely clean as always, still standing at attention as if ready to receive the rodents that had been dead for weeks. He missed them, but the circle of life was a bitch and he couldn’t bring back what had died of old age.

Teddy pottered about in his boxers for some time, leaning against the kitchen counter eating cereal out of a shining new bowl. He was chewing contentedly on a mouthful of soggy Cornflakes when he decided to glance at the clock, and did a rapid double take.

Swearing, Teddy placed the bowl gently into the sink, walking quickly over to the dresser by his bed that stored all of his clothes. He hadn’t realised he’d slept in at all, let alone how late. He had to be at the shoot for one in the afternoon.

The curtains, blue in colour and fading by the day in the sun, were closed as he changed.

                Dressed, Teddy grabbed his camera, a new one after his old had been broken at a concert, from where it lay on his nightstand and hung it from around his neck. After a moment’s deliberation, he left his eerie yellow contacts in their case and kept the thick-framed glasses on. He grabbed his worn satchel and favourite parka, left to warm on the radiator, as he made his way out of the door. Although he was still embracing the punk edge that ran in his blood, as Victoire had put it, he couldn’t relinquish his old hipster traits.

Then he was dashing down the stairs, taking them two at a time. There was a lift in the building, but it was slow. Most of the building was in a minor state of disrepair still, but at least the graffiti in the stairwells had been painted over, and carpet covered the cigarette burns on the ground. It was affordable, he supposed, but a lot of places were for him now.

                Teddy squinted in the sunlight when he emerged from the building, flicking his fringe over his face to partially shield his eyes. London was busy during the summer, full of even more tourists to compete for space with the natives on the street. Outside his building was packed with people, some hurrying, others dawdling. Teddy had no idea why anyone would want to go on holiday to London, or live there- except for, of course, one girl he had never managed to forget.

He joined the masses of people hurrying to the nearest Underground station, his teeth worrying at his lower lip. The delay of lying in and not realising he’d done so had taken a chunk out of his morning, and if he didn’t hurry he wasn’t going to be at the shoot on time.

At this point in his life, he knew the Underground like the back of his hand and he could navigate it with ease. It was second nature, an instinct he half expected to pass down to his children if he had any. It was a long journey, about as far as the tube would take him, and he’d never travelled this way before, but he was sure he could manage.

It was swelteringly hot in the trains during summer, with heat from the sun competing with bodies. But as he’d grown, so had his interest in the people around him. Being spoken to by strangers still held little appeal, but he glanced with interest from person to person as he sat down. That redhead with freckles who looked like a skinnier version of his god-sister; the boy with an emo haircut bent in half over a journal filled with cramped, tiny handwriting; the two girls sat at the very edge of a row, little fingers linked and hair shorn short. He never felt anything like he did when it came to Victoire, but these were all people he could, and would have liked, to photograph. They were all beautiful and interesting in at least one respect, and they all had stories he would have liked to try and tell.

One headphone in, Teddy sat relaxed in a seat as he flicked through to his ‘happy playlist’ which Albus Severus had put together for him a little while ago. It was the only one on his iPod which didn’t conjure mental images of blonde hair and the bluest eyes he’d ever seen.

_And I’ve been a fool and I’ve been blind, I can never leave the past behind._

 

***

 

The shoot was taking place on the edge of a small forest, and Teddy had a while to walk to it even after he left the Underground. He made it on time, though, introducing himself to the director with a faint smile, laughing in the right places at his jokes. He’d been getting more and more work lately, photographing models for advertisements and occasionally fashion spreads in magazines- he was well used to everything by now. Even if they weren’t the artsy photographs he wanted to take, with soft lighting and girls who could cut him with their bone structure, they were fun. Besides, he’d begun to take those kinds of photographs in his spare time anyway, amassing a larger and larger portfolio on his website (where _Wonderless_ was still tucked away separately, such an old shoot that he still considered his very best work, true art).

                As such, he no longer really bothered trying to fuss with the shoots he did for work. He trusted the directors and the stylists, and he just took the photographs. It worked.

His eyes were downcast, focused on messing with his camera, and if he heard a soft gasp he didn’t bother looking up to see where it had come from. When his eyes did eventually flicker up to see what he was dealing with him, it was his own lips that sucked in a sharp breath.

The model had pale blonde hair that had been teased into waves that crashed down to her waist. Her heart-shaped face was very lightly made up, with minimal foundation and a thin covering of eyeliner around her large, light blue eyes while mascara darkened her near-invisible lashes. In a stark contrast, her full, curved lips were painted a bright and glossy scarlet. She was wearing ankle boots in a light tan colour, tights that made her legs seem bare and a washed-out floral sundress- the focus was on her duffel coat, a few shades darker and less vibrant than the lipstick. That was what she was advertising, and she would do it well. The freckles dusted across her cheeks made her look like a pixie who’d come from the woods, and she carried herself with incredible elegance.

She was so, so beautiful.

Victoire.

                She looked just as surprised to see him as he was to see her, her eyes wide and her red lips parted in surprise. But they were already being pressed to begin the shoot, and there was nothing that they could do, no time to toss even the smallest words at one another. Dutifully, Teddy lifted his camera to his face and began taking pictures, and after a few shocked moments where she stood static, Victoire began to pose. She leaned against trees, alternately wistful and playful, the pretty faery versus the graceful lost princess. She skipped, kicked her legs, laughed and smiled at the camera with her hands tousling her hair. Quirky and cute, she still carried a kind of underlying elegance and beauty that had drawn him to her so much in the first place.

His chest felt constricted, a corset around him laced an inch tighter with every click from his camera. She was here and she was as beautiful as she ever had been. She had put on weight again, her hips widening so that they no longer seemed disproportionate to her fake breasts. She looked brighter, happier, healthier. His heart ached to see her, despite it all. Victoire was right there, close enough to reach out for, and yet not tangible enough to touch. He needed her, craved her.

He couldn’t let her escape again.

 

***

 

There had been a vague plan forming in his mind to catch Victoire during their coffee break and talk to her then; but as it turned out, it was she who corned him underneath the large oak tree she’d been prancing around all afternoon.

She said nothing, at first. It had gotten colder out as time dragged on, and he didn’t envy her bare legs. He fancied he could see whirls of mist escaping from her lips, replacing the words that didn’t seem to want to come out even as she worked her glossy lips.

“Why are you here?” She asked finally. There was a somewhat breathless quality to her voice, like it took tremendous effort to make the words come out.

“I- this is my job.” Teddy replied, his voice somewhat shaky; Victoire sounded genuinely distressed to see him, and he didn’t like that. “I got fired from the magazine, so I- I photograph girls again now.”

She just looked at him, then. She was breathing hard, and it was the rapid rise and fall of her chest that he noticed rather than the swell of her breasts. He wondered when that had started to happen, if it was just with Victoire or with girls in general now. Was this growing up?

“I don’t want you to be here.” She all but whimpered. Her words were not like knives in his chest, it was nothing as dramatic as that. But he still felt as though they had a physical effect of some sort. Pinpricks perhaps, on the inside of his throat, which only worsened as she continued. “I don’t want you in my life.”

“Why not?” Teddy asked. It was all he could think to say, and he didn’t miss a beat in posing the question. He could accept Victoire not wanting a relationship with him in any way, because what was the point in pursuing one if she wasn’t interested? But if that was what was going to happen, he wanted an explanation for it. He wanted to know why she would toss away what they had, why she would ignore how many times they’d come together by pure chance. Fate was something he’d scoffed at since he was a teenager, but after they’d been thrown together so many times…

After what seemed like an eternity paradoxically contained within a few moments, Victoire spoke again.

“Come and walk with me?” She said, her tone caught somewhere between a command and a request. The way she looked up at him through her eyelashes, eyes dark, made it seem more like the latter. Teddy had to oblige, and together they headed away from the shoot, into the woods where the light filtered slowly down through the leaves, green-tinged and sparse. Victoire said nothing, and she didn’t try to touch him, but they walked close enough together that her elbows would occasionally knock into his upper arms where they were crossed over her chest. He didn’t know how it had taken him so long to notice, but with the exception of her breasts Victoire was all angles; sharp bones and pointy joints, her hips hardly widening at all past her waist. He wondered if she’d always looked like that- it wasn’t exactly an ideal figure for glamour. More than anything, she just looked alien in this mundane world. She was still something Else entirely, a faery queen. He was convinced of it.

                “How have you been?” Victoire asked. Teddy doubted that she’d dragged him away from the shoot just to exchange pleasantries, but he played along for now.

“Alright, I guess.” He shrugged non-commitally.                “I like this job, and I’ve been taking photographs that I love in my spare time. I don’t suppose…?”

“I’ve seen them?” Victoire guessed, correctly. “No. I’ve been trying to stay away from your things.”

“Right. What about you? It’s been a while. Almost a year.”

“No shit, Sherlock.” She laughed a little, shaking her head. “I’ve been a lot better. I’m not happy, I don’t think, but things are good. I’m not humiliating myself anymore, work is good, and…” She smiled, then, a secretive little curve to her lips. “I got an audition, for a play. Columbia, in _Rocky Horror._ I decided not to be a snob this time.”

“That’s great.” Teddy blinked. Over time, he hadn’t forgotten anything about Victoire, but the memories had softened like glass worn blunt by an unforgiving sea. With her words, all those secrets whispered in the dark came pouring back to him.

He considered asking the question he really wanted to, and decided it would be a bad idea. But Teddy Lupin was a boy- a man, now- made up of bad ideas.

“Are you seeing anyone?”

She shook her head again, and she laughed.

“I was for a little while, but he was the first since Oscar. Every man I’ve met in a long time has felt… lacking somehow, I think.” She wasn’t looking at him at all, her gaze instead fixed on the small birds that flitted around the canopy of the trees. Somehow, Teddy could see her easily joining them, just jumping up from the ground and taking off to soar through the sky. If anyone could do it, it would be her.

“Is that how you felt about me?”

“No.”

“Then why…?”

“Once upon a time, I thought I might fall in love with you.” She said, and despite her words, she didn’t have the tone of a storyteller. It had taken her a while to answer his half-formed question, but when she did, she jumped right into it. He barely had time to process the shock of her admission before she was ploughing on with her speech. “But, Teddy, it was hopeless, because you were never going to love me back.”

At this, he frowned. He stopped walking, angling his body to halt her in her tracks do and trying to ignore that she shied away from him.

“I already d-” He began, but she cut him off with a voice as sharp as a slap.

“Don’t.” Her voice went through him like a knife through butter, her blue eyes flashing. They were like diamonds, cold and bright in the sun, and for a wild moment he wondered how he’d ever seen her as delicate. She might have been a pixie walking through the real world, but in the old stories, faeries were dark and bitter creatures full of rage. Faeries had never needed anyone to take care of them. “You do not love me, Teddy Lupin.”

“How can you know that?” He asked, throwing up his hands. He didn’t love her; he knew the words were false the second they escaped his mouth. But, goddamn it, she didn’t know that. She was clever, and he had a feeling she knew it, but she couldn’t claim to know how he felt or thought. She didn’t know that a flimsy incarnation or her had spent the last two years constantly racing through his mind and worming her way into everything that he was.

“Because you don’t know me.” Even when she stopped frowning, there was still the ghost of a line on her forehead. Perhaps she’d been frowning a lot, lately.

“I’ve known you for two years.” Teddy couldn’t help but point out, confused. Victoire sighed heavily, and covered her face with her fingers.

“But you still don’t know me.” She protested, her voice muffled. “ _I_ know _you_ , Teddy, and I know that whenever you look at me all you see is, well, how I look.” She lowered her hands, and for a moment he thought her eyelashes looked spiky and wet. “How could I ever be with someone who doesn’t see me for who I am?”

                This time, it was Teddy whose mouth worked uselessly open and closed as he tried to speak. He was _angry_ with her now, with what she had said, and he wasn’t sure if it was the indignant feeling of someone wrongly accused or just because he knew it all to be true.

“That’s not right.” He said finally, shaking his head, and he was convinced that it wasn’t. He could admit that sometimes he maybe didn’t see Victoire the way that he should, the way she should be seen with her flaws as well as her virtues, but he didn’t just see her looks when he glanced at her. He might be enamoured with her appearance, but she was so much more than the way she looked on camera. She was the faery lights above her bed and the battered books on her shelf, and she was a pretentious, stuck-up bitch and she didn’t have half the self esteem that parading around in her underwear required.

And he adored all of her.

                “But I think it is, Teddy.” Victoire said quietly. His eyes were not on her face, but on her feet, and he saw her take a step backwards, like she was about to walk away from him. He had a sudden, terrifying premonition- that they had been brought together by chance so many times now that they never would be again. The universe had given them their opportunities and their chances, and if he let her walk away now than he would lose her forever, and he would never forgive himself.

“Please.” He barked out, stepping forwards to close the short distance that she has created. “God, Victoire, please, I’m begging you to give me some kind of chance-”

“Do you hear yourself?” She asked, shaking her head. For a moment, he was struck dumb by the wave of her hair, and how the hell was he supposed to make an impassioned argument when he was so in awe of everything she was? “You sound so creepy, Teddy, you won’t take no for an answer and it’s-”

“I will!” Teddy promised, wringing his hands. “I will, if you just tell me no now. I know, I know I’m useless and awful and just this silly, immature little boy who can’t see you the way you want to be seen, but I like you. I know how juvenile that sounds but I really do, and all I want is just…”

“Just?”

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes and bowing his head. He had to make this convincing. He had to get her to believe.

“Go on a date with me. To a coffee shop or a teahouse, wherever you want to go. Talk to me. Tell me about yourself, and I’ll tell you about me. I don’t love you and I’m not asking you to marry me, but I want to be with you. I want a chance for us, because I really think we can be something beautiful.” He opened his eyes, meeting her gaze; steady and unfaltering. “Didn’t the pictures prove that?”

                She hovered on the spot for a moment, taking in a deep breath. Then she turned around, and began to walk away, back towards the shoot.

Teddy felt his heart crash through his stomach and crash against the floor. It didn’t break or shatter, but he felt the bruises and the shortness of breath in his lungs. She had gone for good. He had lost her.

                It took him a moment to process the sound of rustling leaves, and before he really knew what was happening she had appeared again, like a lost princess out of the woods holding a bloodied sword in one hand.

Her other hand came up to cup the back of his neck. She kissed him, hard and bruising on one corner of his mouth. It was more of a slap than a kiss, and he loved it. He loved all her anger and her passion.

“Saturday, three o’clock. There’s a teahouse I love in Covent Garden. I’ll send you the name.” She said. Her sword- not a bloodied blade but a pen with red ink- was carving something on the back of his hand, a string of digits that would let him reach her. Reach her, to organise a date. The start of everything that they could be together. His chance.

Then she was gone through the trees, the pixie returning to her home. But he would see her again soon, in minutes that fey magic would make feel like years, and he would immortalize her in film again.

This was not an ending, but a beginning; and the numbers burned into the back of his hand like a promise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the first fanfiction I’ve ever finished, and I’m kind of in shock and awe that I actually managed it. Thank you to everyone that enjoyed and especially reviewed this humble little story, because without it I don’t think I could have kept up with it.  
> Thank you, from the bottom of my heart; and theirs. Word of God: they totally stay together forever and live happily ever after.


End file.
